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LIBRARY 

UNIVCf,...TYOr 
CALirohNIA 

SAN  D1EQO 


LOITERER'S   HARVEST 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK   •    BOSTON   •    CHICAGO  •    DALLAS 
ATLANTA   •    SAN   FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON   •    BOMBAY   •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  LTD. 

TORONTO 


LOITERER'S  HARVEST 


BY 


E.   V.    LUCAS 

AUTHOR  OF  "OVER  BEMERTON'S,"  "MR.  INGLESIDE  " 
"  A  LITTLE  OF  EVERYTHING,"  ETC. 


Nefo  garfc 

THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 
1913 

All  rights  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  1918, 
BY  THE   MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published  October,  1913. 


Nortnooti 

.1.  8.  Gushing  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS 

PAGE 

SEEN  FROM  THE  LINE 1 

DISAPPEARING  LONDON  ......  5 

SURPRISES       .        . 14 

THACKERAY  AT  THE  Punch  TABLE        ....  18 

A  LONDON  SYMPOSIUM 42 

INSULENCE 46 

A  GOOD  POET 50 

WORDSWORTH  Pour  Eire 58 

OLD  CROME'S  HOBBEMA 65 

PERSONS  OF  QUALITY     .        .        .        .        .        .        .89 

THE  JOLLY  GOOD  FELLOWS 127 

THOUGHTS  ON  MAGIC     .......  132 

TOM  GIRTIN 136 

MY  WALKS  ABROAD 141 

UNLIKELY  CONVERSATIONS 162 

THE  PROVINCIAL  EDITOR'S  LETTER-BAG        .        .        .  17.5 

TRACTS  THAT  TOOK  THE  WRONG  TURNING  ' . .—,     .  182 

WAYSIDE  NOTES    ........  186 

THE  FOURPENNY  Box, .  201 

THE  WORST  PRELUDE  TO  ADVENTURE  .  250 


Seen  from  the  Line        "^        ^y        <^y        ^> 

AN  ingenious  friend,  many  of  whose  ideas  I 
have  from  time  to  time  borrowed  or  frankly 
stolen,  projected  once  a  series  of  guide-books,  to  be 
subsidised  by  railway  companies,  which  were  to  bear 
the  same  title  as  this  essay,  and  to  enlarge  upon  the 
towns,  villages,  cathedrals,  mansions,  parks,  and 
other  objects  of  interest,  glimpses  of  which  could  be 
obtained  from  carriage  windows.  Like  too  many  of 
his  schemes,  it  has  as  yet  come  to  nothing ;  but  I 
have  often  thought  of  it  when  travelling,  and  par- 
ticularly when,  as  the  train  rushed  through  Redhill, 
I  used  to  catch  sight  once  or  twice  a  week  of  the 
bleak  white  house  among  the  trees  on  the  slope 
immediately  to  the  east  of  the  station,  because  that 
house  was  built  by  a  man  of  genius  who  has  always 
attracted  me,  and  who  deliberately  placed  it  there 
(and  allowed  no  blinds  in  it)  that  he  might  have 
the  pageant  of  the  sunset  over  the  weald  of  Surrey 
and  Sussex  before  his  eyes. 

But  there  was  another  reason,  of  far  greater  impor- 
tance and  shiningly  unique,  for  looking  for  this  white 

B  I 


Seen  from  the  Line 

house  among  the  hillside  trees,  and  that  is  that  it  is  a 
link  between  the  very  ordinary,  matter-of-fact  person 
whom  I  know  as  myself  and  the  inspired  mystic  who 
wrote  "Tiger,  Tiger,  burning  bright"  and  "Jerusa- 
lem," and  drew  portraits  of  the  prophets  from  his 
inner  vision  —  none  other  than  William  Blake. 

That  there  should  be  any  other  bond  between  us 
than  my  admiration  of  his  genius  will  probably  come 
as  a  surprise  to  most  of  my  friends.  But  it  is  so, 
as  I  will  explain ;  for  the  bleak  white  house  on  the 
hill  is  Redstone  House,  built  by  John  Linnell  the 
landscape  painter  in  1851 ;  and  among  John  Linnell's 
sons  was  William,  the  godson  of  William  Blake, 
named  William  after  him,  who  as  a  child  was  held 
in  Blake's  arms;  and  in  1880,  when  I  was  at  school 
at  Redhill,  William  Linnell  was  the  drawing-master : 
a  rather  testy  old  gentleman  with  a  very  white 
beard,  who  was  possessed  of  that  curious  sensitive 
antipathy  to  cats  which  informed  him  instantly  if 
one  was  in  hiding  anywhere  near. 

Although  no  one  who  has  ever  seen  my  pencil  at 
work  would  credit  the  statement,  I  was  in  a  manner 
of  speaking  "taught  drawing"  by  this  elderly 
professor.  During  the  period  of  his  instruction  the 
privilege  was  not  valued ;  but  now  that  he  is  dead 
and  I  am  older,  I  look  back  upon  it  with  pride  and 
excitement,  for  the  association,  by  bringing  me  so 
near  the  great  visionary,  gives  me  a  caste  almost 
apart.  In  however  many  ways  I  may  approximate 
to  the  mass  of  mankind,  I  am  aloofly  superior  to 
2 


John  Varley 

them  in  this  remarkable  respect :  I  was  taught 
to  draw  by  one  who  had  sat  on  the  knee  of  the 
author  and  illustrator  of  the  Songs  of  Innocence. 
Common  persons  have  no  idea  how  a  thought  such 
as  this  can  invigorate  and  uplift. 

John  Linnell  I  never  saw.  He  was  still  living  in 
1880 ;  but  he  was  enormously  old,  nearly  ninety, 
and  we  heard  terrifying  things  about  him :  of  his 
patriarchal  despotism  in  the  house  where  this  white- 
haired  drawing-master  who  kept  us  so  nervously 
busy  with  our  india-rubber  was  treated  still  as  a 
mere  boy;  of  his  alarming  venerableness,  resembling 
awe-inspiring  figures  in  Blake's  pictures ;  of  his 
uncompromising  austerities  of  life.  As  to  how  far 
these  stories  were  true,  I  have  no  knowledge ; 
but  that  is  what  we  heard,  and  it  was  enough  to 
keep  us  on  half -holidays  from  Redstone  wood. 
Of  course  I  am  sorry  now.  Could  the  chance 
come  again  —  which  are  quite  as  sad  words  as  those 
which  stand  at  the  head  of  "Maud  Miiller" — I 
should  have  many  questions  to  ask  him,  chiefly  of 
course  of  Blake,  but  also  of  that  other  curious 
character  and  even  more  intimate  (because  nearer 
earth)  friend  of  Linnell,  John  Varley,  the  water- 
colour  painter.  For  it  was  to  Linnell  that  Varley, 
in  the  midst  of  a  thicker  crowd  of  misfortunes  than 
ever  —  writs  and  imprisonment  for  debt  and  domestic 
embroilments  —  made  the  immortal  remark  which 
should  have  won  him,  under  any  decent  dean,  a 
niche  of  honour  in  Westminster  ,Abbey  with  the  words 

3 


Seen  from  the  Line 

in  imperishable  gold  —  "But  all  these  troubles  are 
necessary  to  me.  If  it  were  not  for  my  troubles 
I  should  burst  with  joy."  It  would  be  good  to 
hear  at  first  hand  more  of  the  man  who  could  say 
that. 


Disappearing  London 


me,  ah!  give  me  yesterday!"  This 
bitter  cry  is  on  the  lips  of  every  lover  of 
London,  faintly  heard  amid  the  din  made  by  the 
pickaxes  of  the  demolishers  and  the  cranes  and 
trowels  of  the  contractors.  But  the  wish  can  never 
be  granted  ;  at  the  most  we  can  by  hunting  for  it 
cherish  for  a  moment  an  illusion,  and  here  and 
there,  in  the  few  sanctuaries  of  antiquity  and  beauty 
that  remain,  cheat  ourselves  that  time  has  run  back 
and  the  serener  past  again  is  ours.  That  such 
opportunities  must  speedily  beco'ne  fewer  is  of 
course  in  the  very  nature  of  things,  decay  being  a 
law  of  life;  while,  as  it  happens,  the  rebuilder  was 
never  so  urgent  as  now.  The  searcher  for  the 
vestiges  of  that  sweeter  and  older  London  must 
therefore  hasten  —  as  I  have  just  been  doing  —  for  it 
is  astonishing  how  rapidly  an  old  house  can  become 
a  new  one. 

Venerable  and  respected  landmarks  disappear  in 
a  moment,  like  water  into  sand.  Mushrooms 
cannot  grow  more  quickly  than  a  really  beautiful 

5 


Disappearing  London 

but  insufficiently  utilitarian  London  building  can 
vanish.  Let  me  give  two  examples  that  approximate 
to  truth  more  closely  than  most  things  in  the  daily 
Press.  I  remember  how  when  I  first  came  to 
London  and  lodged  in  Golden  Square  I  used  to 
rejoice  in  the  sight  of  a  Georgian  mansion  opposite. 
One  day  I  chanced  to  leave  town  for  an  hour  or  two, 
and  when  I  returned  the  Georgian  residence  was 
brand  new  business  premises.  Again,  I  used  occa- 
sionally at  another  time  to  buy  tools  and  hardware 
necessaries  at  a  seventeenth-century  shop  called 
Melhuish's,  in  Fetter  Lane,  with  yellow  walls  and 
overhanging  gables.  One  day  I  found  that  a  purchase 
would  not  do  and  returned  with  it  to  change  it,  and 
behold,  the  seventeenth-century  shop  had  become 
a  modern  commercial  structure !  Aladdin  himself, 
with  his  lamp  in  hand,  might  yet  take  lessons  in 
speed  from  London  rebuilders;  while  in  the  matter 
of  thoroughness,  no  earthquake  can  compare  with 
the  Duke  of  Bedford,  as  anyone  may  see  by  wan- 
dering at  the  back  of  the  British  Museum  in  the 
expectation  of  finding  the  Bloomsbury  of  yester- 
year. 

When  one  meets  a  London  enthusiast,  and 
peculiarly  so  if  he  is  from  the  country,  or  from 
America  (where  London  is  revered  as  by  few  of  her 
natives),  one  finds  that  the  old  London  that  most 
attracts  him  is  in  three  divisions  —  Shakespeare's 
London,  Johnson's  and  Goldsmith's  London,  and 
Dickens's  London.  I  refer,  of  course,  to  semi-  or 
6 


Staple  Inn 

wholly-domestic  relics  rather  than  to  public  build- 
ings :  I  mean,  for  example,  that  the  pilgrim  seeking 
Johnsonian  London  would  prefer  Bedford  Row,  say, 
which  is  unpreserved,  to  the  house  in  Gough  Square 
(although  I  thank  the  stars  for  that),  which  now  is 
preserved,  just  as  the  lover  of  the  country  prefers 
an  open  heath  to  a  park.  In  other  words,  one 
wants  the  old  London  that  has  survived  by  chance 
rather  than  the  old  London  that  has  been  cherished. 
One  gets  a  truer  thrill  there.  Not  that  I  would 
disparage  or  appear  to  disparage  the  efforts  of  the 
preserver ;  but  for  the  moment  I  am  speaking 
purely  of  the  feelings  of  the  amateur  of  antiquity. 

But  it  is  not  safe  to  postpone  a  visit,  even  to 
some  of  the  cherished  memorials.  That  wonderful 
row  of  timbered  houses  in  Holborn,  for  example, 
which  strike  so  strangely  on  the  vision  of  the 
traveller  who  has  entered  London  at  St.  Pancras  or 
King's  Cross,  and  is  driving  up  the  Gray's  Inn  Road 
—  making  him  almost  rub  his  eyes  and  wonder  if 
he  is  not  dreaming  some  such  dream  as  fell  to 
William  Morris  and  is  described  in  his  memorable 
little  John  Ball  apologue :  that  row  is  in  pious 
hands,  but  it  cannot  last  for  ever.  How  should  it  ? 
A  day  must  come  when  it  will  no  longer  be  con- 
sidered safe :  the  County  Council  will  debate  upon 
it,  and  down  it  will  come,  not  of  course  to  be  utterly 
lost,  because  for  a  certainty  part  at  least  of  the 
facade  would  be  re-erected  at  South  Kensington, 
where  they  have  a  fine  old  London  timbered  fagade 

7 


Disappearing  London 

as  it  is ;  but  the  Tudor  part  of  Staple  Inn  —  the 
identical  houses  that  Shakespeare  often  saw,  and 
perhaps  visited  —  must,  although  so  jealously  watched 
and  restored  and  strengthened,  assuredly  at  some 
not  too  distant  day  perish. 

This  means,  of  course,  that  still  shorter  life  is  to 
be  predicted  for  another  Shakespearean  corner  not 
far  distant  —  Cloth  Fair  —  since  no  wealthy  insurance 
company  is  preserving  that.  Cloth  Fair  is  the 
completes!  unprotected  domestic  relic  of  the  Middle 
Ages  that  London  possesses ;  and  it  has  the  additional 
merit  of  being  genuine  and  not  a  show  place.  Many 
travellers  enter  the  ancient  church  of  St.  Bartholo- 
mew and  gaze,  on  their  way  in,  at  the  backs  of  the 
houses  above  the  graves ;  but  they  do  not  inquire 
farther.  They  do  not  examine  the  fronts  of  those 
houses,  which  are  Nos.  6,  7,  8,  and  9  of  Cloth  Fair ; 
they  do  not  walk  a  few  steps  up  this  mediaeval  street, 
which  wants  only  its  old  signboards  to  make  it  exact 
again,  and  enter  "Ye  Old  Dick  Whittington" 
public-house  —  an  inn  which  dates  from  the  fifteenth 
century  and  has  hardly  been  tampered  with  —  where 
Shakespeare  and  Ben  Jonson,  visiting  Bartholomew 
Fair  together  (as  they  must  have  done),  undoubtedly 
took  a  glass.  Nowhere  in  London  is  such  a  network 
of  tiny  courts  as  you  find  here,  and  some  of  the 
houses  are  still  of  wood.  Ecclesiastical  and  civic 
buildings  of  great  age  are  plentiful,  but  such 
domestic  Tudor  survivals  are  rare,  and  I  hesitate  to 
write  of  Cloth  Fair  at  all,  for  fear  that  the  rash 
8 


Old  London's  Enemies 

words  may  catch  the  eye  of  a  municipal  restoring 
and  modernizing  zealot. 

Had  it  not  been  for  the  sight  of  a  portfolio  of 
delicate  London  drawings  by  Mr.  P.  Noel  Boxer,  I 
might  never  have  seen  Cloth  Fair  again :  just  through 
that  postponing  tendency  which,  although  so  natural, 
must  be  one  of  the  bitterest  things  that  dying  men 
reflect  upon.  But  they  were  so  exciting  as  to  send 
me  straightway  on  a  little  tour  of  refreshment, 
beginning  at  that  point.  Directly  I  saw  them,  I 
said  to  myself  I  must  see  again  those  strongholds  of 
ancientry,  those  beautiful,  brave  anachronisms.  I 
said  that  in  the  morning,  and  gave  the  rest  of  the 
day  to  it,  such  terror  one  has  of  London's  renovators, 
whether  corporate  or  individual,  County  Council  or 
British  working  man !  Because  one  can't  really 
trust  anyone.  Look,  for  example,  at  the  gentleman 
in  whose  ingenious  and  altruistic  brain  originated 
the  admirable  (as  I  think)  Daylight  Saving  Bill. 
One  would  expect  in  so  thoughtful  a  philanthropist 
an  especial  reverence  for  such  an  abode  of  peace  as 
Clifford's  Inn,  off  Fleet  Street.  But  you  have  only 
to  go  there  —  and  you  must  be  quick  —  to  read  on  a 
notice-board  that  the  Inn's  purchaser  is  that  same 
Mr.  William  Willett  to  whom  the  sun's  rays  are  so 
dear,  and  it  is  he  who  is  erecting  on  this  sacred  site 
commodious  offices.  So  there  you  are  ! 

That  is  why  I  lost  no  time  in  hurrying  to  Cloth 
Fair,  and  from  there  to  Staple  Inn,  with  its  five 
delicate  plane  trees  in  brightest  green  (and,  of 

9 


Disappearing  London 

course,  as  you  know,  one  of  Staple  Inn's  peculiar 
glories  is  its  forestry.  In  their  haste  people  talk  of 
Bushey  Park  as  a  place  in  which  to  revel  in  the 
beauty  of  trees :  some  even  commend  Burnham 
Beeches :  whereas  the  truth  is  that  only  in  the  law 
inns  and  confined  oases  of  this  dark  city  of  London 
in  the  months  of  May  and  June  is  the  ecstasy  of 
foliage  really  to  be  apprehended).  Before  I  came 
to  Staple  Inn  I  had  peeped  into  that  Georgian  back- 
water Bartlett's  Buildings ;  after  I  left  Staple  Inn  I 
crossed  to  Gray's  Inn  and  drank  in  its  great  peace, 
and  then  took  in  the  noble  Georgian  prospect  of 
Bedford  Row.  Then  I  made  for  poor  Clifford's  Inn 
—  what  is  left  of  it  —  and  then  for  the  Temple,  and 
for  what  I  think  is  its  very  jewel  —  Brick  Court, 
where  (at  No.  2)  Goldsmith  lived  and  died,  and  after 
him  lived  Thackeray  in  the  same  rooms ;  and  so 
down  to  the  Temple  Station,  where  I  took  train  to 
Mark  Lane,  bent  upon  that  part  of  Dickens's 
London  in  which  he  discovered  Rogue  Riderhood. 

At  some  stairs  below  the  Tower  Bridge  I  found  a 
waterman  willing  to  pull  me  hither  and  thither  for 
a  few  shillings.  It  was  a  warm  afternoon  in  a  won- 
derful May,  and,  except  that  I  was  in  the  midst  of 
great  beauty,  I  might,  as  I  leaned  back  in  as  much 
comfort  as  was  obtainable,  have  been  on  a  Venetian 
canal.  But  I  was  not :  the  Thames  warehouses  are 
more  than  palazzi,  and  my  waterman  was  interesting 
beyond  any  gondolier.  He  knew  every  inch  of 
Wapping  and  Shadwell  on  the  north  bank,  and 

10 


"The  Prospect  of  Whitby'' 

Rotherhithe  on  the  south.  He  told  me  the  names 
of  all  the  Stairs  and  particulars  concerning  the 
landlords  of  all  the  inns.  We  passed  between 
barges,  avoided  tugs,  and  rocked  in  the  wash  of 
steamers  all  the  way  to  "The  Prospect  of  Whitby" 
at  Shadwell,  which  is  an  inn  by  the  old  entrance 
to  the  London  Docks,  between  the  Dock  Master's 
little  villa  and  Pelican  Stairs.  Why  it  is  called 
"The  Prospect  of  Whitby"  was  the  only  thing  my 
waterman  did  not  know  about  this  inn,  which  has 
all  the  merits  of  its  kind :  an  air  of  carelessness  and 
ease  not  too  far  removed  from  decay ;  a  balcony 
commanding  the  stream  and  all  its  strange  ships 
and  activity;  and  half  a  dozen  indolent  imbibers 
on  view,  to  whom  I  appeared  almost  as  a  visitant 
from  Mars.  Add  to  this  that  half  the  house  is  wood, 
with  an  aversion  from  paint  as  deep  as  the  habitues' 
aversion  from  water,  and  you  have  "The  Prospect 
of  Whitby"  complete.  But  the  thing  to  remember 
is  that  you  won't  have  it  long.  The  busybody  is 
bound  to-  discover  it  soon  and  talk  pontifically  of 
the  danger  of  wooden  structures  in  this  vast  and 
populous  city  (although  I  found  some  in  Wellclose 
Square  and  some  in  the  Borough  High  Street,  where 
they  are  far  more  dangerous),  and  the  death-blow 
will  be  sounded  to  this  morsel  of  Whistlerian  beauty, 
and  the  Thames  will  lose  another  Dickens  relic. 

Leaving    reluctantly    "The    Prospect   of   Whitby," 
we    crossed    to    the    Rotherhithe    bank,    and    rowed 
casually  back   towards  the  Tower  Bridge   (the  best 
II 


Disappearing  London 

gift  of  modern  architecture  to  London) ;  past  hay 
barges  all  ready  to  the  bland  brush  of  Cotman,  and 
one  loaded  with  grain  and  deserted  by  its  crew,  on 
which  half  the  pigeons  of  London  had  settled  for 
the  banquet  of  the  season ;  past  Rotherhithe  Church, 
with  little  splashes  of  chestnut  leaf  in  its  churchyard 
shining  between  the  warehouses ;  past  other  river- 
side inns  and  that  fine  row  of  insanitary  and  cheer- 
fully broken-down  buildings  which  ends  with  the 
"Angel,"  another  tottering  balconied  hotel  that 
commands  the  Pool  of  London  and  refreshes  the 
Rider  hoods  of  to-day.  It  was  a  brief  voyage,  for  I 
still  had  certain  other  old  London  recollections  to 
revive ;  but  every  second  of  it  was  crowded  with 
interest. 

And  so  I  made  my  way  to  Tabard  Street  and  the 
Borough,  where  the  very  crown  was  to  be  set  on 
Dickens  memories.  For  there  the  "George"  was 
awaiting  a  visit.  Now  what  "Ye  Old  Dick 
Whittington"  in  Cloth  Fair  does  for  the  Shake- 
spearean devotee  the  "George"  in  the  Borough 
does  for  the  lover  of  Piclcwick  and  its  creator. 
Dickens,  of  course,  was  a  modern :  he  has  been 
dead  not  fifty  years ;  yet  what  we  mean  by  the 
words  "Dickens's  London"  is  strangely  enough  more 
extinct  than,  for  example,  Goldsmith's  London, 
although  so  much  older.  Goldsmith  having  the 
fortune  to  be  associated  with  the  Temple,  his 
London  can  never  wholly  pass.  Nor  will  the 
London  that  Dickens  himself  lived  in  and  knew  — 

12 


The  Galleried  "George" 

the  London  of  the  Bloomsbury  squares  and  the 
Clubs  —  wholly  pass  for  many  centuries.  But  when 
we  say  "Dickens's  London,"  we  mean,  of  course, 
hospitable  courtyarded  inns  and  such  riverside 
huddles  of  wharf,  warehouse,  shed,  and  balcony  as 
I  have  been  describing.  And  there  is  only  one 
relic  of  a  courtyarded  inn  left  —  the  "George"  —  and 
that  has  been  mercilessly  reduced ;  although  what 
remains  is  perfect.  It  is  Dickens  in  essence.  How 
any  Dickensian  visitor  to  London  can  possibly  stay 
anywhere  else  is  inconceivable,  for  here  are  the 
bedrooms  opening  on  to  balconies,  exactly  as  on  the 
day  when  Sam  Weller  was  first  discovered  cleaning 
the  boots  of  Mr.  Alfred  Jingle  and  Miss  Rachel 
Wardle  at  the  adjacent  "White  Hart";  here  is  the 
cosiest  and  brightest  of  bars,  with  a  pair  of  pistols 
in  it  such  as  the  guards  of  coaches  carried,  where 
you  may  still  sip  punch,  a  cordial  beverage  practically 
unknown  in  the  rest  of  London  and  England,  and 
very  likely  pineapple  rum  too. 

What  kind  of  life  is  in  store  for  the  "George"  I 
cannot  say ;  but  since  the  painters  were  giving  the 
beautiful  balcony  a  new  coat,  its  demolition  (to 
make  room  for  railway  delivery  wagons)  cannot  be 
instant.  Still,  as  I  said  before,  you  must  make 
haste,  you  who  love  old  London,  for  everything  is 
against  you  —  Time  and  the  elements  are  against 
you,  and  man  and  what  he  quaintly  calls  civilization 
and  progress  are  against  you. 


Surprises    *^y       <^x       -«vy       -^y        -Qy       ^> 

SANCHO  PANZA,  who  was  wise  upon  most 
things,  and  upon  everything  where  wisdom  is 
absolutely  necessary,  once  remarked  that  it  takes 
a  long  time  to  know  anybody.  A  later  sage  has  it 
that  we  know  nothing  about  anybody  at  all.  Both 
these  pronouncements  came  to  my  mind  the  other 
morning  when  I  discovered,  after  an  acquaintance 
of  some  duration,  that  our  veterinary  surgeon  had  in 
his  boyhood  acted  as  one  of  the  readers  who  were 
called  in  by  that  fastidious  and  exacting  gentleman 
of  genius,  the  late  Edward  FitzGerald,  to  regale  him 
with  Dickens's  novels,  an  hour  at  a  time,  owing 
to  the  weakness  of  his  eyes.  But  the  veterinary 
surgeon,  thus  suddenly  endowed  with  a  glamour  of 
which  he  had  been  only  too  innocent  before,  had 
nothing  to  tell.  He  was  no  Boswell.  I  asked  a 
thousand  questions ;  but  he  had  no  answers.  He 
could  not  even  remember  what  books  he  read ;  he 
knew  only  this,  that  he  did  not  like  Mr.  FitzGerald. 
But  what  I  want  to  emphasize  is  the  fact  that  if 
a  million  persons  of  intelligence  (should  there  be  so 

14 


Frank  Smedley 

many)  were  each  to  be  shown  my  friend  and  asked 
to  name  one  of  his  casual  employments  as  a  boy,  not 
one.  would  say,  "He  read  Dickens  to  Edward  Fitz- 
Gerald."  Not  one. 

Since  then  I  have  been  looking  at  fellow- 
passengers  in  the  train,  not  with  more  curious 
interest  than  of  old,  bat  with  a  new  eye.  Instead 
of  conjecturing  as  to  their  walk  of  life  on  the  basis 
of  likelihood,  I  have  speculated  on  a  basis  of  im- 
probability. "You  look  like  a  commercial  traveller," 
I  have  said  inwardly  to  a  well-nourished  vis-a-vis 
with  several  bulging  bags  and  a  big  watch-chain ; 
"you  are  therefore  probably  a  Post-impressionist 
artist."  Or,  "Having  all  the  stigmata  of  a  horse- 
dealer"  —  this  to  another  with  a  smooth,  ferrety  face, 
a  short  Wanghee  cane,  and  riding-breeches,  "you 
probably  helped  Swinburne  with  the  proofs  of  Both- 
well."  For  it  is  the  unexpected  that  happens. 

It  is  an  open  question  whether  it  is  more  amusing 
to  be  surprised  by  the  appearance  of  a  person  much 
thought  about  and  at  last  met  or  to  find  one's 
anticipations  realized.  Certainly  in  the  experience 
of  every  one  there  have  been  some  rude  shocks. 
Edmund  Yates,  in  his  Reminiscences,  supplies  one 
classical  instance,  when  he  records  his  meeting 
with  Frank  Smedley.  Frank  Smedley  is  not  read 
now ;  but  thirty  and  forty  years  ago  he  was  the 
darling  of  schoolboys  by  reason  of  three  novels  which 
glorified  strong  men  and  daring  spirits  —  Frank  Fair- 
high,  Lewis  Arundel,  and  Harry  Coverdales  Courtship. 

15 


Surprises 

In  .these  epics  of  lawless  young  English  gentlemen 
in  the  early  Victorian  days  muscle  is  very  nearly  all. 
Well,  Yates  went  to  see  him.  expecting  a  Hercules, 
and  found  a  wizened  cripple  in  a  Bath  chair. 

The  other  classical  example  that  comes  to  mind 
as  I  write  is  that  of  the  detective  who  was  sent  over 
to  France  to  arrest  Wells,  a  defaulter  become 
famous  throughout  the  world  as  "the  man  who 
broke  the  bank  at  Monte  Carlo."  The  arrest  was 
made  at  a  French  watering-place,  if  I  remember 
aright,  the  wanted  man  being  pointed  out  to  the 
detective  by  a  foreign  colleague.  The  detective's 
comment  is  historic.  "What,!'  he  said,  "that  bleed- 
ing little  tinker ! "  Poor  Wells  !  and  yet  he  had 
brought  it  on  himself.  It  was,  as  the  gentle  Bully 
Smee  remarks  in  Peter  Pan,  after  all  a  bit  of  a  com- 
pliment ;  for  had  he  not  broken  the  bank  no  very 
distinct  conception  of  his  appearance  would  have  been 
formed.  It  was  the  contrast  between  that  news- 
paper glamour  and  the  man's  insufficient  inches 
which  provoked  the  exclamation. 

Conversely,  I  was  not  a  little  astonished,  when  I 
was  introduced  the  other  day  to  one  of  the  quietest 
and  demurest  of  modern  essayists  and  philosophic 
teachers,  to  find  myself  in  the  presence  of  a  giant 
who  looked  far  more  like  a  heavy  dragoon  than  any 
manipulator  of  the  pen.  And  again,  sitting  next 
a  lady  at  dinner  recently  where  another  fairly  well- 
known  essayist  was  present,  she  asked  me  to  point 
him  out.  "Immediately  opposite  you,"  I  said,  in- 
16 


"To  Magazine  Editors" 

dicating  a  clean-shaven  face.  "Oh,"  she  exclaimed, 
"how  funny!  I  always  thought  of  him  as  having  a 
pointed  beard." 

If  I  were  the  editor  of  an  illustrated  paper  or 
magazine  I  would  now  and  then  collect  a  number 
of  my  readers'  ideas  as  to  the  physiognomy  of 
illustrious  but  unphotographed  contributors  and 
then  tabulate  them,  with  a  true  photograph  at  the 
end.  The  result  would  be  at  least  as  amusing  as 
the  pictures  we  now  see  of  celebrities  at  different 
stages  in  their  careers. 

It  is  all  to  the  good  that  insignificant-looking 
persons  should  do  great  things,  but  human  nature 
will  ever  resent  it.  We  are  such  determined 
idealists,  we  have  such  a  passion  for  symmetry,  that 
our  first  wish  will  always  be  that  handsome  does  and 
handsome  is  shall  be  one. 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table  *^y        *cy        *o 

THE  history  of  Thackeray's  connexion  with 
Punch  is  well  known.  He  began  to  contribute 
in  1842,  when  he  was  thirty-one,  the  paper  having 
been  founded  in  1841 ;  he  joined  the  staff  at  the  end 
of  1843  and  remained  actively  upon  it  for  eight 
years,  contributing,  among  other  things,  the  Snob 
papers,  many  of  the  ballads  (including  that  famous 
warm-hearted  one  in  praise  of  the  Punch  Table 
itself,  "The  Mahogany  Tree"),  and  a  variety  of 
other  matter,  even  to  satirical  art  criticism.  He 
left  the  inner  staff,  owing  to  differences  into  which 
there  is  no  need  to  enter  here,  in  1851,  but 
continued  to  write  occasionally  until  1854.  Yet 
although  Thackeray  ceased  to  write  then,  he  did  not 
sever  his  social  connexion  with  the  paper,  frequently 
joining  his  old  friends  at  the  Table  at  the  weekly 
dinner  till  within  a  few  days  of  his  premature  death, 
and  often  either  suggesting  the  cartoon  or  materially 
assisting  it. 

In   1858  a  new  recruit  came  to  the  paper  in  the 
person    of    Henry    Silver,    then    a    young    lawyer    of 
18 


Mark  Lemon 

thirty,  to  take  the  place  left  vacant  by  the  death  of 
Douglas  Jerrold  in  1857,  and  Silver  kept  a  record  of 
each  dinner  that  he  attended  and  the  best  things 
said  there  for  twelve  years,  until,  in  1870,  he  retired. 

Silver  died  in  1910,  leaving  a  seven -figure  fortune, 
which  the  papers  were  so  tactless  as  to  describe  as 
that  of  "a  Punch  contributor,"  but  which,  I  need 
hardly  say,  did  not  represent  his  earnings  as  a  comic 
journalist,  and  leaving  also,  to  the  proprietors  of 
Punch,  a  large  collection  of  original  drawings  by 
Leech,  Tenniel,  Keene,  and  others  of  the  paper's 
artists,  together  with  his  Dinner  Diary.  It  is 
this  Diary  which  lies  before  me  and  yields  the 
present  crop  of  Thackerayana,  which,  if  not  of  the 
highest  value,  has  an  interest  inseparable  from  any 
words  spoken  by  that  shrewd  and  benignant  great 
man  at  his  ease  among  colleagues  whom  he  trusted. 

Before,  however,  we  come  to  the  Diary  proper,  it 
would  be  well  to  survey  the  staff  in  the  year  1858, 
when  Silver  began  to  take  notes.  The  editor  was 
Mark  Lemon,  the  corpulent  and  jovial,  who  had 
controlled  it  from  the  first  number  —  July  17th,  1841 

—  and   who   must   always   be   considered   its   father. 
At  any  rate  —  be  the  "onlie  begetter"  who  it  may, 
and  there  is  a  certain  mystery  surrounding  the  birth 

—  it    was    Mark    Lemon's    personality    which,    more 
than    anyone's,  determined    the    personality    of    Mr. 
Punch,  and  is  still  potent.     In  1858  Mark  was  forty- 
nine,  with  twelve  years  of  life  before  him,  and  this 
Diary    reveals    him    in    a    very    pleasant   light   as   a 

19 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

simple,  jocose,  kindly,  philanthropic,  busy  man  of 
the  world,  and  a  very  devoted  husband  and  father. 
It  is  evident  also  that  he  had  much  tact.  His 
contributions  to  the  conversation  are  chiefly  remin- 
iscences of  the  earlier  days  of  Punch,  of  the  Stage, 
and  so  forth ;  but  he  says  a  few  good  and  many 
sound  and  serious  things,  and  occasionally  brings 
stories  of  his  children,  as  when  he  tells  of  one  of  his 
little  girls  replying  to  her  sister  who  wished  to  keep 
her  out  of  the  drawing  room,  "Let  me  go  in;  I've 
as  much  parlour  blood  as  you." 

Next  to  Lemon  in  authority  and  resourcefulness 
was  his  deputy,  Shirley  Brooks,  whom  the  Diary 
shows  us  to  have  been  a  less  simple  soul  than  Mark 
—  very  ready  with  anecdotes,  puns,  witty  criticisms, 
improvised  burlesques,  and  useful  suggestions  for 
cartoons,  a  viveur  and  a  good  deal  of  a  cynic.  Brooks 
was  then  forty-two,  and  had  been  on  Punch  only 
seven  years.  Like  Lemon,  he  was  a  very  versatile 
and  industrious  man  and  could  turn  his  ready  pen 
and  astounding  memory  to  anything.  But  neither 
was  more  than  a  journalist :  nothing  that  they 
wrote  lived  after  them.  Shirley  Brooks  appears  for 
the  most  part  as  a  brilliant  commentator,  interject- 
ing single  remarks;  but  he  has  stories,  too,  a  little 
sardonic  or  destructive  as  a  rule,  as  when  he  tells 
of  the  Yankee  who  refused  to  allow  his  wife  to 
bring  their  children  to  see  him  hanged.  "What 
a  shame!"  she  replied:  "just  like  you  —  never 
letting  them  have  any  pleasure."  Brooks  had  many 

20 


Tom  Taylor 

interests,  and  one  week  writes  off  to  Augustus  Egg, 
the  artist,  a  suggestion  for  a  picture :  Dr.  Johnson 
in  his  night  rambles  putting  pennies  in  beggar-boys' 
hands  as  they  lay  asleep  on  doorsteps.  If  this  was 
not  worked  upon,  it  should  be. 

Shirley  Brooks  was  to  succeed  Mark  as  editor  in 
1870,  and  Tom  Taylor  was  to  succeed  Shirley  in 
1874.  Tom  Taylor  in  1858  was  forty -one  and 
had  been  on  Punch  since  1844.  He  was  less  nimble 
in  fancy  than  Mark  or  Shirley,  but  was  more  solidly 
grounded  than  either,  and  not  only  was  known  by 
his  dramas  and  adaptations,  but  had  been  Professor 
of  English  Literature  in  the  London  University  and 
was  art  critic  of  the  Times.  He,  like  Lemon,  is 
chiefly  reminiscent  and  brings  accounts  of  dinners 
he  has  attended  and  men  he  has  met.  But  he  has 
a  few  stories,  one  of  which  is  of  a  child  asking  to  be 
allowed  to  wear  his  drum  while  saying  his  prayers 
—  if  he  promises  not  to  think  of  it. 

An  older  hand  on  the  paper  than  Taylor  was 
Horace  Mayhew,  brother  of  Henry  Mayhew,  who 
had  been  in  at  the  birth  with  Mark  Lemon,  but 
was  now  living  in  Germany  and  devoting  his  time  to 
the  literature  of  philanthropy.  In  1858  Horace  was 
forty-two  and  had  just  come  into  money,  which 
enabled  him  to  take  life  easily  and  treat  his  Punch 
duties  rather  lightly.  He  was  known  as  "Ponny" — 
supposed  by  Silver  to  be  derived  from  Pony,  Mayhew 
having  acted  as  Mark  Lemon's  pony,  or  sub-editor, 
for  some  years.  He  could  be  argumentative  and 

21 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

provocative,  but  that  was  when  he  had  dined 
particularly  well.  One  of  the  neatest  puns  in  the 
book  is  his.  Percival  Leigh  had  been  to  South- 
ampton, where  he  played  skittles  in  an  alley 
decorated  with  portraits  of  the  Muses.  "The 
motto,"  said  Mayhew,  "should  be  'Descend,  ye 
Nine.'" 

Percival  Leigh,  known  as  the  "Professor,"  was 
trained  for  a  doctor,  and  at  Bart.'s  had  had  as  fellow- 
students  Leech,  Albert  Smith,  and  Gilbert  a  Beckett, 
all  on  the  staff  of  Punch  in  their  time.  Leigh  joined 
the  paper  soon  after  it  started  in  1841.  In  1858  he 
was  forty-five,  and  he  lived  until  1889.  The  Diary 
makes  him  a  rather  precise  if  not  dull,  talker,  and 
fond  of  serious  discussion.  Leigh  and  Leech  were 
not  only  old  friends,  but  they  had  collaborated, 
before  Punch  was  started,  on  the  Comic  English 
Grammar  and  The  Children  of  the  Nobility. 

Next,  the  two  artists,  for  there  were  but  two  on 
the  Table  in  1858.  Chief  of  these  was  John  Leech, 
who,  born  in  1817,  had  been  at  Charterhouse  with 
Thackeray  (although  much  his  junior).  He  joined 
Punch  when  it  was  three  weeks  old,  and  was  its 
greatest  draughtsman  for  many  years.  He  was  now 
forty-one,  too  near  the  end  of  his  short  life  and 
beginning  to  be  the  victim  of  those  street  noises 
which  accelerated  that  end.  The  Diary  shows  him 
to  have  been  less  genial  and  tolerant  in  conversation 
than  with  his  pencil ;  but  he  was  of  the  greatest  use 
in  discussing  the  cartoons,  although  it  was  urged 

22 


Leech  and  Tenniel 

against  him  that  his  disapproval  of  suggestions  was 
too  drastic:  a  "juggernaut,"  Keene  later  called  him, 
Leech's  conversation  is  largely  critical,  but  he  has 
stories  now  and  then,  very  much  in  the  vein  of  his 
social  jokes  in  the  paper.  One,  for  example,  is  of  a 
little  girl  who  was  asked  why  she  was  so  affectionate 
to  her  aunt,  almost  more  so  than  to  her  mother,  and 
replied,  "Oh,  mamma,  of  course  I  love  you  best,  but 
then  I  must  be  civil  to  aunt  because  she  spreads  the 
jam." 

Next  to  Leech,  John  Tenniel,  the  only  member 
of  the  staff  at  that  time  who  is  still  living.  Sir  John 
joined  Punch  in  1850,  and  left  to  pass  into  honourable 
retirement  in  1900.  He  is  now  (1913)  in  his  ninety- 
fourth  year.  The  Diary  records  few  of  his  remarks, 
but  shows  him  to  have  made  excellent  suggestions 
for  pictures.  He  and  Leech  hunted  together  a 
good  deal. 

The  proprietors  were  William  Bradbury,  grand- 
father of  one  of  the  present  heads  of  the  firm,  and 
Frederick,  or  "Pater,"  Evans,  whose  daughter 
married  Charles  Dickens  the  younger.  There  is  no 
Evans  in  the  business  to-day. 

As  to  Silver  himself,  he  seems  to  have  been  a  very 
modest,  quietly  observant  young  man,  with  a  useful 
knack  of  writing  whatever  was  wanted  on  the  rather 
more  substantial  side  —  such  as  theatrical  notices, 
and  so  forth.  His  chief  contribution  to  the  paper 
was  a  Comic  History  of  Costume,  illustrated  by 
Tenniel. 

23 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

Such,  then,  was  the  staff  of  Punch  in  1858  when 
Silver's  Diary  begins ;  but  it  is  with  these  men  only 
in  relation  to  Thackeray  that  we  are  concerned. 
The  Diary  records  many  amusing  things  said  by 
them ;  but  for  the  most  part  these  are  anecdotes, 
puns,  and  repeated  jests.  Able  as  they  were,  and, 
collectively,  powerful  as  they  were,  each  is  dwarfed 
in  the  presence  of  Michael  Angelo  Titmarsh. 

In  1858  Thackeray  was  forty-seven,  and  the  author 
of  Vanity  Fair,  Pendennis,  Esmond,  and  The  Newcames. 
The  Virginians  was  now  appearing  serially.  He  had 
still  to  become  editor  of  the  Cornhill  and  to  write 
The  Adventures  of  Philip.  In  the  summer  of  1858 
the  unfortunate  quarrel  with  Edmund  Yates  had 
begun  and  was  still  in  progress.  Yates  had  written 
in  a  periodical  an  account  of  Thackeray  which 
Thackeray  thought  not  only  unjust  but  too  personal. 
Thackeray  also  thought  that  only  by  being  a  member 
of  the  same  club  (the  Garrick)  as  himself  could  Yates 
have  obtained  some  of  his  data,  and  he  therefore 
demanded  Yates's  expulsion.  Dickens  took  Yates's 
side  and  the  Punch  men  naturally  took  Thackeray's ; 
hence,  to  a  large  extent,  the  regrettable  hostility  to 
Dickens  which  continually  appears  in  the  Diary,  but 
of  which  I  say  little  or  nothing.  Rather  does  one 
remember,  and  again  remember,  what  each  man  said 
of  the  other  in  moments  of  calm  detachment,  and 
particularly  Thackeray's  tribute  to  Boz :  "I  may 
quarrel  with  Mr.  Dickens's  art  a  thousand  times ;  I 
delight  and  wonder  at  his  genius ;  I  recognise  in  it 
24 


An  Old  Carthusian 

—  I  speak  with  awe  and  reverence  —  a  commission 
from  that  Divine  Beneficence  whose  blessed  task  we 
know  it  will  be  one  day  to  wipe  every  tear  from 
every  eye.  Thankfully,  I  take  my  share  of  the  feast 
of  love  and  kindness  which  this  gentle  and  generous 
and  charitable  soul  has  contributed  to  the  happiness 
of  the  world.  I  take  and  enjoy  my  share,  and  say  a 
Benediction  for  the  meal."  —  The  situation  at  the 
Punch  Table  was  not  made  less  difficult  by  the  circum- 
stances that  Mark  Lemon  and  Dickens  had  been  close 
friends,  and  Evans  was  the  father-in-law  of  Charles 
Dickens  junior.  Also  that  Bradbury  &  Evans,  after 
having  been  Dickens's  publishers,  were  just  about 
starting  a  rival  to  All  the  Year  Round,  called  Once  a 
Week. 

We  meet  Thackeray  at  the  Table  first  on  October 
21st,  1858,  the  dinner  being  at  the  "Bedford"  in  Covent 
Garden ;  and  he  is  at  once  kind  to  Silver  and  takes 
champagne  with  him.  To  have  been  at  Charterhouse 
was  a  main  road  to  the  heart  both  of  Thackeray  and 
Leech.  Thackeray  "makes  a  cheese  Devil  to  wind 
up  with.  Talks  of  Mackay  [Charles  Mackay,  the 
song  writer,  now  forgotten]  and  his  liking  for  Kitawba 
wine ;  and  says  his  poetry  is  like  it  — •  sparkling  but 
not  so  creamy  as  Moore's  champagne  or  so  sound  as 
Scott's  claret.  Brooks  makes  some  references  to  the 
Hoggarty  Diamond,  whereat  Thackeray  challenges 
him  to  champagne  and  inquires  after  his  health  and 
family's.  Thackeray  says  that  Leech  has  the  best 
beer  and  claret  in  London.  Wishes  for  a  cottage, 

25 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

like  Macready's,  the  walls  hung  with  caricatures  and 
cuts  from  Punch:  there  would  he  end  his  days." 

On  December  15th,  1858,  it  is  discovered  that  an 
article  in  a  preceding  number,  entitled  "A  Hall  of 
Dazzling  Light,"  describing  Evans's  Rooms  under 
the  name  of  "Bivins's,"  was  by  Charles  Dickens 
junior,  and  is  voted  an  imitation  of  Sala,  and 
Thackeray  describes  Sala's  style  as  "Dickens  and 
water."  The  name  of  Sala,  I  may  say,  often  crops 
up  in  these  pages,  and  always  leads  to  an  argument 
as  to  how  clever  he  is.  One  or  two  of  the  staff  seem 
to  have  been  a  little  envious  of  his  gifts  and  success. 

On  December  22nd,  1858,  we  find  a  guest  at  the 
Table  —  Sir  Joseph  Paxton,  the  great  gardener  and 
builder  of  the  Crystal  Palace,  who  was  always  wel- 
come. "Plain-spoken  man,"  says  Silver,  "and  drops 
an  H  occasionally ;  but  clearly  a  clear  head,  and  not 
a  bit  stuck  up."  Sir  Joseph  confesses  to  having 
drunk  in  his  time  "enough  champagne  to  wine  the 
road  from  St.  Paul's  to  Hammersmith." 

On  January  19th,  1859,  "Leech  applauds  the 
Saturday  Review  for  cutting  up  Jerrold."  Mark 
Lemon  defends  him,  and  in  parting  says  to  Silver, 
"I  don't  like  to  hear  him  ill-spoken  of:  he  was  always 
kind  to  young  men  and  gave  them  a  helping  hand." 
Among  the  stories  of  Jerrold,  a  few  of  which  are 
recalled  whenever  his  name  is  mentioned  at  the 
Table,  is  his  reply  to  some  ene  who  said  that  when 
Thackeray  was  in  Rome  they  tried  to  make  a  Roman 
of  him:  "They  should  have  begun  with  his  nose." 
26 


Libraries  in  Heaven  ? 

It  is  needless  to  explain  that  Thackeray's  nose  was 
broken  when  he  was  at  Charterhouse,  but  it  is  not 
so  generally  known  that  that  is  why  he  gave 
Titmarsh  the  Christian  names  of  Michael  Angelo, 
who  also  had  this  disfiguration.  Thackeray  and 
Jerrold  seem  not  to  have  been  on  the  best  of  terms. 
One  reason  given  by  Henry  Silver  is  that  the 
sight  of  Jerrold  eating  peas  with  a  knife  got  on 
Thackeray's  nerves. 

Thackeray  comes  in  again  on  January  26th,  and 
at  the  Table  receives  and  corrects  a  Virginians  proof. 
He  tells  Silver  it  will  inform  him  of  the  name  of  the 
head  master  at  Charterhouse  a  hundred  years  ago  — 
Dr.  Crucius.  Owns  to  having  been  flogged,  and  says 
it.  "hurt  like  hell." 

On  February  10th  there  is  talk  of  books.  Shirley 
wonders  if  reading  books  which  one  hasn't  time  to 
read  on  earth  will  form  one  of  the  joys  of  Paradise. 
Thackeray  says  that  a  man  who  produces  cannot 
hope  to  read  much.  He  then  describes  a  German 
pianist  guest  of  his  who  threw  his  best  cigars  on  the 
fire,  saying,  "We  pay  duppence  for  a  zigar  like  zis 
at  Brussels." 

On  March  2nd  Thackeray  is  present  to  eat  a 
haunch  of  venison,  but  has  to  leave  at  nine  to  "go 
to  a  tea-fight  at  the  Bishop  of  London's."  Thus  do 
the  gods  interfere.  But  before  he  goes  he  has  the 
opportunity  to  "laugh  consumedly"  at  a  joke  of 
Shirley  Brooks  which  I  cannot  possibly  print,  and  to 
make  a  few  kindred  ones  himself,  and  to  say  to  Silver, 
27 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

"I  went  to  Charterhouse  the  other  day.  Hadn't 
seen  School  come  out  since  I  left.  I  saw  one  little 
fellow  with  his  hands  behind  him  and  a  tear  on  his 
cheek  and  two  little  cronies  with  their  arms  round 
his  neck,  and  I  knew  what  had  happened  and  how^ 
they'd  take  him  away  and  make  him  show  his  cuts." 
(Mr.  Spielmann,  in  his  History  of  Punch,  quotes  nearly 
the  whole  of  this  entry :  the  only  extract  from  the 
Diary  that  has  previously  been  made.) 

There  is  then  a  long  interval,  and  the  next  dinner 
to  be  described  is  January  18th,  1860,  when  the 
news  is  brought  that  80,000  of  the  first  number  of 
Cornhill,  under  Thackeray's  editorship,  have  been  sold. 
On  February  1st,  1860,  Leech  tells  of  treating 
his  little  girl  to  a  shillingsworth  of  Punch  and 
Judy.  "Doorsteps  and  pavement  instantly  crammed. 
Where  do  the  children  come  from  ? "  Considering 
how  Leech  suffered  from  street-organs,  this  encour- 
agement of  the  itinerant  entertainers  was  very  brave 
and  good  of  him.  He  goes  on  to  tell  of  the  time 
when  he  was  in  a  debtors'  prison.  He  once  saw  "a 
few  boys  having  a  holiday  —  being  taken  to  see  a 
gentleman  arrested."  Percival  Leigh  sold  litho- 
graphed caricatures  for  him.  "Used  to  kiss  female 
prisoners  through  the  bars." 

On  February  8th,  1860,  we  have  the  debut  at  the 
Table  of  Charles  Keene.  Keene  was  then  forty-six, 
had  drawn  for  Punch  since  1851,  and  was  destined 
to  be  a  pillar  of  the  paper  for  thirty-one  years.  Sir 
Joseph  Paxton  was  present,  and  Mark  Lemon,  when 
28 


Samuel  Rogers 

he  asked  him  to  champagne,  was  accused  of  "fawning 
on  the  aristocracy." 

On  February  15th  Thackeray  appears  again,  and 
the  guest  of  the  evening  is  the  Rev.  S.  Reynolds 
Hole,  afterwards  Dean  of  Rochester,  and  a  famous 
rose-grower.  Thackeray  had  received  £50  for  a  lec- 
ture at  Liverpool,  and  put  it  into  ten  dozen  of  port. 
"Laid  in  200  dozen  of  claret  last  year  at  £5." 
After  dinner  he  goes  first  to  the  Geographical 
Society  and  then  to  Lord  Cockburn's  the  Chief 
Justice. 

On  March  14th  there  is  talk  of  Samuel  Rogers. 
Leech  calls  him  roundly  a  humbug,  but  Tom  Taylor 
denies  this.  He  tells  of  dining  with  Rogers  and 
old  Maltby  —  "petit  diner  et  pas  d'erreuer  —  3  smelts 
for  fish  and  all  on  that  scale,"  and  goes  on  to  imitate 
Rogers'  toothless  voice  saying,  "I'm  an  old  man  and 
have  a  small  voice;  and  if  I  don't  say  ill-natured 
things  sometimes,  I  shouldn't  be  listened  to."  Re- 
lates that  Rogers  told  Maltby  that  somebody  actually 
asked  if  his  name  was  Rogers.  "Well,  and  wasn't 
it?"  replied  Maltby,  obliviously  repeating  the  offence. 
This,  by  the  way,  was  William  Maltby  (1763-1854), 
the  librarian  of  the  London  Institution  for  many 
years,  and  the  lifelong  friend  of  the  banker-poet. 

On  April  llth,  1860,  Thackeray,  having  got  rid 
of  No.  5  of  the  Cornhill,  is  thinking  of  running  over 
to  Paris  for  a  day  or  so.  "He  gives  kudos  to  Gryll 
Grange  by  Peacock.  Written  by  a  gentleman,  he 
says.  Adds  later  that  he  would  like  to  have  four 
29 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

sheets  a  year  to  write  and  no  more."  Then,  "he 
would  write  such  letters  to  ladies."  Thackeray 
writes  a  poetical  inscription  in  The  Virginians  to 
Peter  Rackham  (a  financial  friend  of  Bradbury  and 
Evans,  who  was  present  at  the  dinners  now  and 
then),  but  Silver  gives  only  this  :  — 

different  opinions 

....  about  The  Virginians. 
Accept  the  book,  dear  friend,  and  if  you  find  it 
Pleasant  to  read  ...  I  hope  you'll  bind  it. 

On  October  16th  Thackeray  was  not  present,  but 
there  was  talk  of  him.  Taylor  thought  him  the 
most  miserable  of  men,  mentally  as  well  as  from 
almost  constant  pain.  Leigh  likens  him  to  Swift  — 
"despises  Vanity  Fair  [the  place,  not  the  book]  and 
despises  himself  for  taking  pleasure  in  it."  Lemon 
tells  of  Thackeray  at  a  dinner  given  to  Dickens 
when  John  Forster,  with  whom  Thackeray  was  on 
very  bad  terms,  said,  "Here  are  our  two  greatest 
writers.  One  extracts  good  from  evil,  and  the  other 
finds  evil  in  everything  that's  good."  Thackeray, 
I  may  say,  was  subject  for  years  to  spasms  which 
caused  him  both  pain  and  anxiety. 

On  October  30th  the  staff  discuss  schoolboy  ethics. 
Tom  Taylor  holds  that  every  one  has  stolen  when  a 
boy.  He  himself  stole  his  schoolmaster's  apples. 
Leech  is  indignant  and  says,  "God  forbid  my  boy 
should  steal."  Taylor  tells  of  Sala  leaving  lodgings 
at  Erith  suddenly  after  ordering  a  beef-steak  pudding 

30 


Scott  and  Tennyson 

for  dinner  and  returning  six  months  later  with  the 
remark,  "Is  that  pudding  boiled  yet?" 

On  November  6th  Thackeray  is  present  again  and 
quotes  these  lines  as  a  sample  of  rhythmical  in- 
genuity, but  they  cannot,  I  feel,  be  correctly  given 
by  Silver :  — 

Let  some  intelligent  officer  be  sent  to  the  front ; 
"Hardman,  step  forward,"  said  Sir  Hussey  Vivien,  K.C.B., 
"and  bear  the  battle's  brunt." 

In  a  conversation  on  the  theme,  Which  great  man 
of  the  past  one  would  soonest  meet  ?  Brooks,  Leigh, 
and  Silver  say  Dr.  Johnson,  but  Thackeray  chooses 
Scott:  "that  dear  old  Sir  Walter."  He  adds  that 
Byron  was  a  "raffish  snob." 

On  November  20th  Thackeray  is  troubled  by  a 
little  coolness  shown  him  by  one  of  Dickens's 
children.  "Let  fathers  hate  each  other  like  hell, 
but  why  need  their  children  quarrel  ? "  he  says.  He 
denies  that  it  is  natural  for  rival  writers  to  be 
enemies.  He  calls  Tennyson  "the  greatest  man 
of  the  age :  has  thrown  the  quoit  farthest."  Brooks 
thereupon  remarks  that  Vanity  Fair  ranks  higher 
than  anything  of  Tennyson's,  and  asks,  "Would  you 
change  your  reputation  for  his?"  "Yes,"  says 
Thackeray ;  but  is  not  believed.  Scott  as  a  poet 
then  crops  up  and  is  praised  for  stirring  the  blood. 
"But,"  says  Thackeray,  "I  don't  want  to  have  my 
blood  stirred;"  and  afterwards,  "Thank  God  that 
the  world  is  wide  and  tastes  are  various,  and  what- 

31 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

ever  mental  food  be  offered  there  are  sure  to  be 
customers." 

On  December  4th  Thackeray  tells  of  his  mother- 
in-law  giving  him  claret  a  six  sous,  and  now  drink- 
ing wine  of  his  at  seven  shillings  a  bottle.  His 
daughters,  too,  are  "terribly  matured  in  their  taste." 

On  December  llth  he  remarks  to  Leech,  "How 
happy  we  were  this  day  forty  years  ago,  breaking 
up  at  Charterhouse!"  Remembers  Leech  at  six- 
and-a-half  in  his  form :  Master  Bush  just  like  him. 
Leech  tells  how  he  has  been  "coaling  the  waits" 
from  his  bedroom  window,  and  says  he  would  like 
£1000  and  a  country  life.  "Couldn't  do  it,"  says 
Thackeray.  Dickens,  some  one  says,  made  £10,000 
by  his  readings  in  1860.  Thackeray  says  he  made 
only  half  that  altogether,  and  it  is  suggested  that 
Leech  should  read  publicly  the  lines  under  his 
drawings. 

The  following  week  —  December  18th,  1861  —  the 
prevailing  topic  is  the  death  of  Prince  Albert. 
Some  one  says  that  Sala  has  received  £100  from 
Smith  &  Elder  for  a  trip  to  Genoa  to  make  a 
Cornhill  article,  and  Thackeray  adds  that  it  is  for 
the  "Genoa-wary  number,"  which  is  a  fair  sample 
of  many  outrageous  puns  of  his  that  I  have  omitted. 

On  January  8th,  1862,  Shirley  Brooks  tells  how 
he  once  danced  with  Grisi :  "like  waltzing  with 
a  whirlwind."  Thackeray  and  Leech  recall  old 
Charterhouse  songs. 

On     January     15th     Leech     describes     Manning's 

32 


Street  Music's  Victim 

execution,  which  he  saw,  and  tells  of  Calcraft  the 
hangman  saying  of  a  hanging,  "No,  sir,  I  wasn't 
altogether  pleased  with  it." 

On  January  29th  Brooks  tells  of  Rossini  being 
summoned  to  Louis  Napoleon's  box  and  apologizing 
for  his  frock-coat.  "No  need  of  etiquette  between 
sovereigns,"  was  the  reply. 

On  February  5th  Silver  is  asked  by  Thackeray  if 
he  recognizes  his  daughter  in  the  person  of  a  pine- 
apple from  Pernambuco  —  "Pinus  Silvse  filia  nobilis." 

On  February  19th  there  is  talk  of  Bill  Jerrold. 
"He  writes  well  and  looks  well,"  says  Thackeray. 
"But  his  plays  have  all  been  damned,"  says  some 
one.  "Yes,  he's  a  damned  clever  fellow,"  says 
Thackeray:  "Now  I  could  never  get  a  play  damned." 

On  February  26th,  1862,  Mark  Lemon  tells  that 
he  once  dreamed  a  play,  sprang  up  and  sketched  it, 
and  got  £100  and  a  violent  cold.  Keene  says  that 
he  often  dreams  usable  Punch  jokes.  "Thackeray 
tells  of  how  he  went  to  Bristol  as  a  boy  with  his 
father  the  General,  and  his  mother  with  her 
diamonds,  and  they  went  gorgeously  to  the  play. 
And  next  time  he  went  he  was  an  actor  himself, 
lecturing  on  the  Georges."  "Leech  piteous  in  his 
complaints  of  the  organ-men.  'Got  up  twice  the 
other  night  to  send  them  away.  They're  killing  me. 
The  only  way  to  get  sleep  is  to  get  into  a  train  and 
give  the  guard  half-a-crown  to  keep  the  door  locked. 
Silver  laughs  and  Tenniel  laughs,  but  it's  no  joke 
indeed.'" 

D  33 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

On  March  5th  Leech  says  something  lenient  about 
Mormonism.  "Aha!"  Thackeray  replies,  "I  dine 
with  you  sometimes,  and  can  tell  your  horrid 
thought.  I'll  be  your  haunting  demon."  Later 
Shirley  quotes  from  The  Shabby  Genteel  Story  the 
saying  that  somebody  spoke  so  satirically  that 
nobody  could  understand  him.  "Bless  you,  Brooks  !" 
says  Thackeray. 

The  next  week,  March  12th,  Thackeray  brings 
news.  He  has  left  the  Cornhill.  Smith  "a  noble, 
generous  fellow,"  says  he,  but  wished  to  have  a  co- 
editor  and  not  a  sub.  "Fact  is,  Thackeray  doesn't 
do  editor's  work,  which  is  to  read  and  judge,  not  to 
write.  .  .  .  Thackeray  has  built  his  house,  costing 
£5000,  out  of  his  two  years'  savings,  nearly.  Leigh 
tries  to  make  him  hark  back  —  only  a  slight  difference 
and  might  be  adjusted.  Thackeray  says  Lucas 
[editor  of  Once  a  Week]  pitched  into  him  for  trying 
to  get  Once  a  Week  artists  to  work  for  Cornhill. 
Keene  refused.  Thackeray  thinks  Free  Trade  is 
the  right  policy  in  literature  and  art.  Man  takes 
his  work  where  he's  best  paid  for  it.  Thackeray 
likes  his  Lovel  the  Widower  and  Smith  doesn't. 
Acted  it  at  Kensington  the  other  night  —  his 
daughter  Minnie  good,  and  Morgan  John  O'C.  as 
footman."  Mark  Lemon  then  discourses  of  editor- 
ship and  says  that  Thackeray's  name  made  Cornhill, 
but  Thackeray  says  it  was  made  by  Trollope's  serial, 
Framley  Parsonage. 

Later  Thackeray  says  that  John  Forster  cuts  him, 

34 


The  Palace  Green  House 

but  "he  can't  be  savage,  because  it  was  Forster  who 
brought  Dr.  Eliotson  to  him  and  saved  his  life." 
Envying  Brooks  his  ready  pen,  Thackeray  says  it 
takes  him  "two  days  to  think  of  a  Roundabout  and 
one  day  to  write  it.  Writes  best  out  of  his  house : 
anywhere  except  at  home."  Elsewhere  Silver  says 
that  Thackeray  writes  currente  calamo  and  hardly 
makes  a  correction.  Dickens,  on  the  contrary,  almost 
rewrites  with  interlineations. 

On  April  9th  Leech  disapproves  of  Frith's  "Derby 
Day."  "Not  a  bit  like  life.  Swell  in  black  cloth 
trousers  !  Says  a  man  should  like  horses  to  paint 
them." 

On  July  9th  Thackeray  has  the  staff  to  dine  with 
him  in  his  new  house  at  Palace  Green ;  Lucas,  of 
Once  a  Week,  and  a  nameless  young  man,  a  friend  of 
the  family,  being  also  present.  Thackeray's  spoons 
are  much  admired,  especially  a  Dutch  one,  with  a 
chain  on  a  leg,  which  he  bought  for  £4  at  The 
Hague,  and  saw  one  like  it  in  the  Strand  marked 
£12.  "Gilt  foliated  mirror  frame,  £30,  very  hand- 
some," Silver  records.  "Queer  old  pictures  —  Dutch 
fighting  piece  —  portraits,  &c."  Thackeray  says  they 
were  all  "made  out  of  his  inkstand";  and  adds  that 
when  he  married  he  and  his  wife  looked  at  a  house 
in  Brunswick  Square  and  found  it  too  dear  —  £80. 

On  July  16th  Lemon  tells  of  a  French  duellist 
shooting  a  young  Englishman  after  1814.  An 
Englishman  in  the  green-room  hearing  the  story 
goes  out  and  returns  in  three  days,  saying,  "I've 

35 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

shot  that  Frenchman."  Thackeray  says  he  met  the 
Englishman  in  Paris.  (Silver  queries  if  it  were 
Captain  Gronow.) 

On  September  18th  Thackeray  is  "brimming  with 
bad  jokes,"  but  none  are  quoted. 

On  September  24th  Mark  Lemon  "talks  of  pawn- 
brokers dining  together  and  pledging  one  another." 
The  Telegraph  has  announced  in  its  fashion  columns 
that  "Mr.  Thackeray  and  Mr.  Leech  and  the 
remainder  of  the  Rothschild  family"  are  at  Folke- 
stone, and  this  leads  to  much  chaff.  • 

On  October  8th  Thackeray  says  Mrs.  Yates  (nee 
Elizabeth  Brunton,  the  actress,  and  his  enemy's 
mother)  was  his  "boyish  love."  Talks  of  old  farces, 
&c.  Mark  Lemon  says  that  Punch  was  never  so 
prosperous  as  now,  in  spite  of  the  plagiary  of  "Punch," 
as  Thackeray  calls  Fun.  Keene  thinks  that  Punch 
some  day  will  be  drawn  with  a  nimbus  —  St.  Punch. 

On  October  29th  there  is  a  discussion  on  life  and 
its  pleasures.  Mark  says  that  duties  are  worth 
living  for.  There  is  more  happiness  in  helping 
others  than  in  living  for  oneself.  Brooks  denies 
this.  "Thackeray  says  that  when  he  was  on  his 
death-bed  (as  he  thought)  he  was  perfectly  content 
and  happy.  He  is  not  deterred  from  wrong-doing 
by  fear  of  a  future  state,  but  by  feelings  of  present 
disgrace  and  dishonour."  Later  Thackeray  "tells 
how  Forster  was  annoyed  by  his  hit  at  him  in  Esmond 
as  'Mr.  Addison's  man,'  Dickens  being  Mr.  Addison." 

On  November  26th  Thackeray  says  "he  feels  a 
36 


"Mind,  no  Biography" 

sort  of  (TTopyr)  [natural  affection]  when  he  reads  his 
daughter's  [now  Lady  Ritchie]  Story  of  Elizabeth. 
She  has  all  my  better  parts  and  none  of  my  worse." 
Brooks  admires  her  pure  English  and  likens  her  to 
Minerva  from  the  brain  of  Jupiter.  Thackeray  says 
his  feeling  is  shared  by  his  mother,  who  says  she 
can't  read  his  books  —  "As  many  others  do,"  he  adds. 
Leech  sleeps  at  his  new  house  at  Kensington  for  the 
first  time  to-night.  (6  The  Terrace,  Kensington, 
which  Silver  afterwards  took.  It  is  now  shops.) 
After  he  has  gone,  Thackeray  "writes  the  Lord's 
Prayer  in  the  size  of  a  threepenny-bit,  drawing  the 
crown  and  3  in  centre,  and  gives  it  to  Mark  Lemon 
with  lines  round  it :  — 

Dear  friend,  I've  writ  this  little  page 
When  one  and  fifty  is  my  age,  &  etc. 

In  walking  away,  I  talk  of  reading  John  Wilson's 
Life  (Christopher  North)  and  admire  his  manliness  in 
turning  to  work  when  he  lost  all  his  fortune :  also  his 
thrashing  the  tinker,  &c.  Thackeray  dissents.  Says 
John  Wilson  did  nothing  worth  record  and  the  effect 
of  the  Life  on  him  [Thackeray]  was  to  make  him  tell 
his  daughters,  'Mind,  no  biography' — of  himself." 

On  April  1st,  1863,  Thackeray  says  he  writes 
when  he  sits  down  to  write ;  as  soon  as  he  gets  his 
nose  to  the  desk  his  ideas  come.  Later  he  defends 
Colenso  and  denies  the  Creation  in  six  days.  But 
on  this  point,  as  we  shall  see,  he  changed  his  views. 
"Jonah  and  sun  standing  still  he  views  as  fables." 

On  April   15th  Leech   tells  of  his   rushing   out  of 

37 


bed  to  silence  what  he  thought  were  Volunteers 
who  were  playing  in  a  public-house  near  by.  "We're 
Foresters,  sir,"  said  one.  "Then  why  the  devil 
don't  you  go  and  play  in  a  forest?"  Leech  asked. 

On  May  27th,  1863,  Thackeray  says  that  he  once 
told  his  daughters  that  he  wished  they'd  take  the 
Bear  at  Esher  for  a  home.  Breakfasting  at  Glad- 
stone's recently,  he  met  an  American  lawyer  and 
thanked  him  for  a  Press  which  had  warned  him  to 
change  his  investments. 

It  was  on  June  17th,  1863,  that  Sir  Francis 
Burnand  ate  his  first  dinner  as  a  member  of  the 
Punch  staff,  on  which  he  was  to  remain  so  long, 
succeeding  Tom  Taylor  as  editor  in  1880.  Thackeray 
was  not  present :  but  on  June  24th  he  was,  and  very 
full  of  suggestions  for  a  cartoon  about  sweating  in 
dressmaker's  workrooms.  Said  that  to  avoid  any 
such  result  his  daughters  always  ordered  their 
dresses  a  month  in  advance. 

On  July  22nd,  1863,  the  staff  are  again  Thackeray's 
guests  at  Palace  Green.  In  addition  to  Thackeray, 
there  is  a  barrister  cousin  from  Canada  named 
Beacher,  and  a  Southern  American  named  De  Leon, 
who  had  described  blockade-running  in  Cornhill; 
but  nothing  much  is  recorded  of  the  evening,  except 
that  there  was  turtle  soup,  turbot,  curried  lobster, 
venison  pie,  cold  beef,  jelly  bloaters,  and  ice  cream 
after  cheese.  Thackeray  confessed  to  a  fear  of 
burglary  and  American  share  confiscations,  and  was 
demanding  £100  for  each  Roundabout  in  consequence. 

38 


A  Colenso  Discussion 

On  August  12th  "the  old  Yates  row  crops  up,  and 
Thackeray  fires  at  Horace  Mayhew  and  says,  'Damn 
it,  you  fellows  still  seem  to  think  it  was  because  of 
his  attack  on  my  nose  that  I  fell  foul  of  him.  I 
don't  care  a  damn  for  my  nose.  He  imputed  dis- 
honourable conduct  to  me,  and  for  that  I  got  him 
kicked  out  of  the  Garrick.'  'With  your  strength 
you  might  have  been  more  generous,'  says  Horace, 
and  Thackeray  blazes  up  and  finally  bolts." 

On  December  2nd  Thackeray  chaffs  Mark  Lemon 
about  a  mistake  in  his  novel  Wait  for  the  End,  when 
he  makes  term-time  at  Cambridge  in  September. 
Lemon  tells  them  that  "Weaver"  in  the  novel  is 
Webster  the  actor,  and  "Stella"  is  Mrs.  Mellon. 
Says  Mrs.  Mellon  often  used  to  come  to  him  and  say, 
"'I  think  So-and-So  should  have  those  lines  to  say: 
they'll  be  more  effective  so  than  if  I  say  them.' 
Never  knew  any  other  actor  to  do  this.  'Rupert 
Melville'  he  meant  for  Edmund  Kean,  who  used  to 
attend  'The  Harp'  by  Drury  Lane  and  stand  20 
glasses  of  grog  to  poorer  actors,  many  of  whom 
drank  themselves  to  death."  Later  the  Table  falls 
again  upon  a  Colenso  discussion,  Thackeray  contend- 
ing for  the  six  days  as  stated  by  the  actual  Word 
of  God. 

On  December  9th  Thackeray  is  late,  as  he  "could 
not  resist  the  tripe  at  the  Reform  Club."  A  week 
later  he  is  present  again,  but  for  the  last  time,  and 
"pitches  into  Mayhew  because  his  [Thackeray's] 
two  guineas  to  the  Julian  Patch  subscription  is 

39 


Thackeray  at  the  Punch  Table 

entered  as  coming  from  Arthur  Pendennis.  Says  he 
particularly  begged  that  his  name  might  not  appear : 
'They'll  be  at  me  again,  those  damned  penny-a- 
liners.'  Horace  explains,  and  says  the  case  is  really 
a  deserving  one.  'Very  well,  then,  I'll  give  you  a 
fiver  besides,  in  my  own  name,'  says  Thackeray. 
Tells  also  of  one  or  two  fellows  who  have  extracted 
fivers  and  tenners  from  him  at  his  house  and  at  his 
clubs  and  in  the  streets  and  in  the  Parks.  In  fact, 
his  purse  is  never  safe."  Again  Colenso  breaks  in. 
Thackeray  says,  "We  have  God's  own  word  (in  His 
commandments)  that  He  made  the  world  in  six  days, 
and  yet  geologists  tell  us  it  took  millions  of  years  to 
make.  Qui£n  sabe?"  and  these  are  his  last  recorded 
words  at  the  Punch  Table. 

Thackeray  died  on  Christmas  Eve,  1863,  and 
Mayhew  brought  the  news  late  in  the  evening,  and, 
according  to  the  late  Frederick  Greenwood,  all 
joined  in  singing  "The  Mahogany  Tree."  The 
effect  must  have  been  overwhelming :  — 

Here  let  us  sport, 
Boys,  as  we  sit ; 
Laughter  and  wit 
Flashing  so  free. 
Life  is  but  short  — 
When  we  are  gone, 
Let  them  sing  on 
Round  the  old  tree. 

Mayhew  led  the  song.  I  cannot  conceive  how  he 
ever  got  through. 

40 


"The  Mahogany  Tree" 

Evenings  we  knew 
Happy  as  this ; 
Faces  we  miss, 
Pleasant  to  see. 
Kind  hearts  and  true, 
Gentle  and  just, 
Peace  to  your  dust ! 
We  sing  round  the  tree. 

The  week  following,  the  day  of  the  funeral,  there 
was  no  Dinner.  Silver  says,  "I  never  felt  a  loss  so 
much,  except,  of  course,  those  of  my  relations.  And 
yet  I  was  not  privileged  to  rank  myself  as  more  than 
a  casual  acquaintance.  But  his  kindliness  extended 
to  the  smallest  of  his  visitors,  and  he  never  snubbed 
one  or  ignored  their  presence.  What  the  loss  must 
be  to  his  old  chum  and  schoolfellow  Leech,  who  can 
pretend  to  estimate  ?  .  .  .  The  loss  is  a  national  one, 
but  the  nation  cannot  judge  how  his  family  and  his 
friends  feel  it." 

On  January  12th,  1864,  "Leech  says,  'Thank 
God  we  shan't  have  to  go  round  with  the  hat :  his 
daughters  will  have  £1000  a  year  between  them.' 
Says  he  can't  sleep  without  dreaming  of  poor 
Thackeray  —  been  sleeping  alone,  so  disturbed  is  he." 

Leech  survived  his  friend  only  a  few  months, 
dying  on  October  29th,  1864,  aged  only  forty-six. 
Both  lie  at  Kensal  Green,  and  Shirley  Brooks  was 
buried  near  them. 

On  November  7th  Leech's  successor,  George  Du 
Maurier,  took  his  seat  at  the  Table ;  and  so  the 
world  goes  on. 

41 


A  London  Symposium  <o        <^y       ^y       ^cy 

WE  were  talking  about  London.  It  is  a  good 
subject. 

"What  is  the  prettiest  sight  in  London?"  some 
one  had  asked ;  and  we  were  discussing  it,  each 
naming  his  choice. 

"The  prettiest  sight  in  London?"  I  said.  "Why, 
a  string  of  hay  barges  being  towed  up  the  river  by 
a  tug  at  six  o'clock  on  a  fine  afternoon.  Seen 
from  the  Embankment  somewhere  about  Cleopatra's 
Needle,  or  from  Westminster  Bridge  looking  east." 

They  agreed  that  that  was  a  good  sight,  and  we 
passed  on  to  the  next  opinion.  This  was  the  lady's  in 
the  grey  hat.  "The  most  beautiful  sight  in  London 
in  summer,"  she  said,  "is  the  sky  above  the  Court  of 
Honour  at  the  White  City  just  after  the  lamps  are 
lit.  It  is  the  deepest,  richest,  intensest  blue  you 
ever  dreamed  of.  There  are  many  lovely  intense 
blues  —  the  blue  of  the  peacock,  the  blue  of  the 
kingfisher,  the  blue  of  a  Persian  tile,  the  blue  of  a 
Rhodian  plate  —  but  this  is  the  most  wonderful  of  all." 

We  agreed  again ;  but  an  objection  was  lodged  by 
42 


London  Birds 

the  author  of  the  debate.  "Not  a  beautiful  sight," 
he  said,  "but  a  pretty  sight  is  what  we  want.  You 
fly  too  high.  London  is  so  full  of  beauty  that  we 
must  discuss  that  later.  Just  now  we  are  after 
pretty  things  only.  Next,  please." 

The  journalist  came  next.  "To  me,"  he  said, 
"there  is  nothing  prettier  than  the  pigeons  at  the 
Museum  soaring  round  and  embarrassing  a  little  girl 
with  a  bag  of  corn  —  especially  if  you  see  them  as 
you  go  in,  with  the  darkness  of  the  portico  for  a 
background.  That  is  pretty,  if  you  like.  And  then 
some  one  will  startle  them,  and  they  will  fly  up  to 
the  roof,  blue  grey  and  white  grey  against  black  and 
grey,  and  mere  prettiness  goes  and  beauty  is  achieved. 
The  distinction  is  illustrated  there  in  perfection,  I 
think." 

"If  it  comes  to  birds,"  said  his  neighbour,  "surely 
the  gulls  at  Blackfriars  Bridge  are  even  more  beauti- 
ful. Their  movements  are  freer,  their  wings  are 
broader ;  they  suggest  the  open  sea.  And  yet  here 
they  are  in  London  in  their  hundreds  waiting  to  be 
fed,  just  as  if  they  were  sparrows  on  a  frozen  lawn 
in  winter." 

"Oh,  but  what  about  the  little  red  cottage  among 
the  rushes  at  the  Horse  Guards'  end  of  St.  James's 
Park?"  said  the  lady  in  the  black  hat.  "It  is  like 
a  toy,  and  the  ducks  and  moorhens  and  coots  and 
terns  swim  about  in  the  water  beneath  it,  while  the 
guinea-fowls  and  pelicans  and  storks  promenade  on 
the  banks.  That's  most  awfully  pretty  always." 

43 


A  London  Symposium 

The  lady  in  the  purple  hat,  who  sat  next  to  her, 
murmured  approval.  "Yes,"  she  said,  "I  have 
often  watched  them.  But  my  vote  for  the  prettiest 
sight  would,  I  think,  go  to  the  little  mothers  in  the 
parks  —  Kensington  Gardens,  say  —  all  so  busy  with 
their  families  —  so  grubby  and  so  slangy  and  yet  so 
responsible  and  masterful.  I  see  them  every  fine 
day,  and  they  always  delight  me.  It  is  funny  that 
little  girls  should  so  naturally  suggest  mothers, 
while  little  boys  never  suggest  fathers.  Yet  so 
it  is." 

There  was  some  talk  as  to  whether  the  lady  in 
the  purple  hat  had  described  prettiness  so  much  as 
an  interesting  spectacle ;  but,  after  all,  it  depends 
(as  she  said)  very  much  on  how  you  use  words. 

"Well,"  said  her  neighbour,  "I  believe  I  can 
beat  that.  You  vote  for  the  little  girls;  my  vote 
shall  go  to  the  little  boys.  Do  you  know  that  this 
summer,  on  a  hot  week-day  afternoon,  I  went  all 
the  way  to  Victoria  Park  in  the  East  End  just  to 
see  the  bathers  there  ?  It's  a  shallow  lake,  a  hundred 
yards  long,  and  I  swear  to  you  that  there  were  a 
thousand  little  East  End  boys  in  ic  at  once  —  all  naked 
and  glowing  in  the  sun,  and  all  so  jolly.  I  never 
saw  so  many  naked  boys  before.  It  was  'the  colour 
of  life'  in  intensest  movement.  I  thought  of  Blake's 
line,  'thousands  of  little  boys  and  girls  waving  their 
innocent  hands' ;  but  these  were  flashing  their 
innocent  limbs.  It  is  not  only  my  prettiest  London, 
sight  but  the  most  cheerful." 
44 


The  Pony-Carts 

This  contribution  completing  the  list,  we  waited 
for  the  author  of  the  discussion  to  name  his  choice 
and  end  it.  "Well,"  we  asked,  "and  what  is  the 
prettiest  sight  in  London  ?  " 

"The  pony-carts,"  he  answered.  "The  little  pony- 
carts  that  crop  up  mysteriously  among  the  wagons 
and  taxis  and  motor-buses  in  Piccadilly  and  the 
Strand,  even  in  Cheapside,  and  trot  along  so  bravely 
and  undismayed,  and  take  their  place  so  naturally 
in  these  untoward  surroundings,  and  disappear  as 
suddenly  as  they  came.  I  always  stand  to  watch 
them  —  the  plucky  little  things,  with  their  absurd 
little  four  brisk  legs,  and  their  four  merry  little 
hoofs,  and  their  two  ridiculous  wheels.  They  are  to 
me  the  prettiest  sight  in  London." 

Personally  I  think  the  Victoria  Park  bathers 
won  it. 


45 


Insulence    «o        -c*        ^y        «o        *o       -cy 

r  I  "'HAT   word    at    the   head   is    spelled    correctly. 

JL  I  wrote  it  with  the  greatest  care.  It  is  an 
invention  of  my  own,  a  blend  of  "insular"  and 
"insolence,"  and  it  was  coined  to  describe  that 
habit  and  carriage  of  an  Englishman  abroad  which 
are  found  so  objectionable  by  Continentals  who  have 
not  our  island  heritage  of  security  and  liberty ;  and 
I  have  been  thinking  about  it  because  I  suddenly 
ran  into  two  perfect  examples  of  insulence  the 
other  day,  here,  at  home,  in  an  English  country 
district,  and  realized  then,  in  a  flash,  how  the 
Frenchman  feels,  and  why.  For  the  moment, 
indeed,  I  was  a  Frenchman,  and  these  were  invaders 
from  a  dominant  race  who  have  no  conscription  to 
make  all  men  equal.  Personally  I  hate  the  idea 
of  conscription,  but  I  think  I  can  understand  how 
it  feels  to  be  one  of  a  conscripted  people  and  watch 
the  unimaginative  and  complacent  antics  of  visitors 
from  a  nation  of  cricketers  ruled  by  a  Cabinet  of  golf- 
players,  as  one  of  our  most  caustic  critics  has  put  it. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  was  from  two  golfers  that 
I  gained  my  insight  into  insulence. 
46 


The  Royal  and  Ancient 

Why  does  golf  make  some  men  so  intolerable  ? 
Not  all,  of  course,  but  too  many.  Why  is  it  that 
one  would  rather  walk  home  than  sit  in  a  railway 
compartment  amid  a  certain  type  of  golfer  ?  Racing 
men  can  be  coarse  enough;  but  they  do  seem  to 
belong  to  the  human  family.  Cricketers  can  be 
boring  enough,  with  their  slang  and  their  records ; 
but  they,  too,  are  men.  Footballers  can  be  noisy 
and  rowdy  enough ;  but  there  is  a  basis  of  geniality 
under  all.  Lawn-tennis  players  can  be  frivolous 
enough;  yet  one  knows  that  they  mean  well.  But 
these  golfers  ?  What  is  there  about  golf  to  so  lift  a 
man's  nose,  and  curl  his  lip,  and  steel  his  manners,  and 
doom  him  to  dwell  in  the  wilderness  of  superiority  ? 

I  have  thought  about  this  problem  a  good  deal, 
and  have  hazarded  scores  of  conjectures.  Can  it 
be  that  he  has  a  suspicion  ?  Can  he  feel  that  this 
discreet  and  pedestrian  pastime,  at  any  rate  for  a 
young  and  active  man,  is  a  little  bit  foolish  ?  Can 
he  wonder  sometimes  if  a  man  who  carries  such  a 
quiverful  of  clubs  with  which  to  urge  so  small  and 
white  a  ball  over  suburban  fields  is  not  an  object 
of  laughter  ?  Does  he  ever  speculate  whether  he 
ought  not  to  be  doing  something  else  ?  Can  he 
entertain  a  doubt  that  a  game  may  be  wrong  when 
it  involves  the  employment  of  a  boy  to  carry  one's 
implements  and  is  played  by  so  many  couples  at 
once,  each  in  a  sea  of  green  enisled,  passing  like 
ships  in  the  night  ?  It  may  have  occurred  to  him, 
very  possibly,  that  the  true  root-idea  of  a  game  in 

47 


Insulence 

the  open  air  is  a  communistic  striving  at  high 
pressure,  and  that  possibly  the  almost  episcopalian 
discretion  and  selectness  of  golf  are  a  mistake  and 
a  rather  foolish  one. 

I  am  not  bringing  these  charges  against  golf.  I 
am  merely  speculating  on  the  causes  of  the  insulence 
of  insulent  golfers.  I  am  trying  to  find  some  reason 
for  the  conversion  by  this  game  of  quiet,  nice, 
modest  men  into  monsters  of  'metallic  aloofness  and 
self-esteem.  Aware  of  the  game's  pettinesses,  is  it 
that  they  are  forced  into  unnatural  crustaceousness 
and  complacency  as  a  defence  ? 

Or  perhaps  they  may  be  overburdened  by  the 
consciousness  of  their  legs  ?  For  this  game,  which 
involves  only  a  stationary  ball  and  calls  for  no  running 
—  nothing  more  than  such  a  sober  and  dignified  gait  as 
an  undertaker  might  indulge  in,  or  a  Bath-chair  man  — 
yet  demands  knickerbockers  and  stockings.  Perhaps 
some  men's  calves  are  too  much  for  them.  They  were 
for  Sir  Willoughby  Patterne,  the  champion  egoist, 
who  would  surely  have  played  golf  superbly.  I  am 
inclined  rather  to  favour  this  calves  theory  because 
I  have  often  found  golfers  to  be  quite  social,  kindly 
creatures  in  their  ordinary  clothes,  when  not  bent 
upon  their  sport.  Released,  indeed,  from  its 
dominion,  they  can  be  as  other  men.  But  once 
they  come  again  under  its  power,  instantly  their 
naturalness  disappears,  and  the  iron  (and  often  the 
brassie)  enters  into  their  soul. 

Or  it  may  be  that  the  golfer  is  overcome  by  the 
48 


The  Stolen  Commons 

age  and  honourable  traditions  of  his  game.  It  may 
even  be  that  he  took  to  it  because  of  a  certain 
aristocratic  aroma  that  clings  to  it,  and,  fearful 
of  being  thought  an  intruder,  he  too  adopts  the 
classic  restraint  and  disdain  of  Vere  de  Vere  —  as 
he  imagines  it.  Here  and  there  the  village  people 
whose  common  has  been  converted  into  a  links  by 
the  neighbouring  gentry  are  allowed  also  to  play, 
when  the  light  is  getting  poor,  and  are  encouraged 
by  a  cup  or  medal  (I  have  a  case  in  mind  where 
the  common  is  not  safe  to  walk  over  any  longer) ; 
but  for  the  most  part  golf  remains  exclusive :  a  kind 
of  open-air  extension  of  club-life.  Perhaps  it  is 
this  high-handed  confiscation  of  commons  that  is 
preying  on  the  golfer's  mind,  and  he  has  added  a 
veneer  of  moral  confidence  and  self-approval  to 
conceal  the  subsidence  of  conscious  virtue  within. 

Or  is  it  that  the  game  is  too  much  for  him  all 
round  ?  As  some  horses  cannot  stand  oats,  so  some 
men  cannot  stand  golf.  Again  I  am  only  specu- 
lating, and  speculating,  probably,  very  idly.  But 
it  is  an  interesting  study,  the  anti-social  demeanour 
of  the  insulent  golfer,  even  if  one  observes  it  for  no 
other  purpose  than  to  try  to  be  more  at  one  with  the 
critical  Continental. 

Yet  even  I,  who  write  these  words,  perhaps  have 
the  appearance  of  a  golfer  when  I  am  abroad. 


49 


A  Good  Poet        -csx       *o        <^        ^        ^ 

THIS  is  frankly  a  eulogy.  For  that  is  the  only 
way  to  deal  with  poetry :  either  leave  it  alone 
or  be  enthusiastic  about  it.  It  is  also  an  expression 
of  thanks,  for  many  of  Mr.  Chalmers's  lines  have 
been  running  in  my  head  this  last  fortnight,  an 
undercurrent  of  melody  amid  all  London's  cacopho- 
nies, and  since  every  lyric  in  his  little  book  l  gives 
me  pleasure,  I  want  to  state  my  gratitude  to  him 
for  the  new  music  and  new  fancy  and  new  grace  which 
he  has  brought  into  a  world  the  visible  delights  of 
which  he  is  tireless  in  extolling. 

England  was  never  richer  than  now  in  writers  of 
light  verse,  many  of  them  of  astonishing  technical 
excellence,  and  most  of  them  urbanely  witty  to  a 
point  that  fills  an  ordinary  person  with  despair ;  but 
Mr.  Chalmers,  while  equal  to  any  in  deft  dexterity, 
is  different.  He  is  less  of  the  school  of  Seaman 
than  of  Dobson ;  indeed,  he  has  been  reviving  in 
me  sensations  of  satisfaction  such  as  I  have  not 
felt  since  Old-World  Idylls  (which,  with  Abbey's 

1  Green  Days  and  Blue  Days.  By  Patrick  R.  Chalmers. 
Maunsel  &  Co.,  Dublin.  3s.  6d. 

50 


Of  the  Tribe  of  Austin 

frontispiece  and  its  perfect  title-page,  and  Alfred 
Parsons's  tailpiece,  I  shall  always  consider  the  best- 
published  book  of  our  time)  made  life  so  much 
better  in  1883.  There  is  nothing  derivative  about 
Mr.  Chalmers ;  it  is  merely  that  his  view  of  things 
is  not  unlike  Mr.  Dobson's.  He,  too,  has  the  lightest 
of  touches,  the  urbanest  of  smiles,  a  memory  stored 
with  classical  lore,  a  tender  heart,  and  the  gentlest 
sophisticated  humour ;  where  he  differs  chiefly  from 
Mr.  Dobson  is  in  his  love  of  the  open  air.  Mr.  Dobson, 
I  feel  sure,  has  shot  no  partridge,  stalked  no  deer, 
killed  no  salmon ;  Mr.  Chalmers  rejoices  in  sport. 

Mr.  Chalmers  does  as  a  poet  what  I  as  a  critic 
should  like  to  do  —  he  writes  only  of  such  things  as 
please  him.  He  spins  little  fantasies  about  old 
china  and  Oriental  figures ;  he  revels  luxuriously 
in  memories  of  fishing  days ;  he  lets  his  thoughts 
wander  to  the  river  bank  on  summer  nights ;  he 
tilts  wittily  and  wisely  at  the  things  that  do  not 
matter ;  he  commemorates  the  virtues  of  his  dogs ; 
he  glorifies  flowers  and  butterflies ;  and  now  and 
then  he  crystallizes  his  experience  in  some  ingenious 
apologue.  Now  and  then,  too,  he  has  eyes  and  a 
phrase  for  a  pretty  girl.  And  it  is  all  done  so 
musically  and  so  engagingly,  and  yet  with  a  certain 
seriousness  as  well,  which  is,  I  think,  the  reason  that 
he  makes  such  an  appeal.  One  knows  that  he  feels 
what  he  writes.  It  all  comes  from  within. 

Let  me  borrow  gaiety  and  distinction  and  charm 
for  my  pages  by  quoting  two  or  three  examples. 

51 


A  Good  Poet 

This  "Contrast"  shows  Mr.  Chalmers  at  his  most 
ingenious  and  most  cultured.  It  is  almost  an  indoor 
poem,  not  quite.  Nothing  can  keep  Mr.  Chalmers 
indoors  for  long,  and  there  is  his  strength  and,  as  I 
have  said,  his  chief  difference  from  Mr.  Dobson, 
who  has  never  wandered  farther  than  to  the  sundial, 
bless  him  !  Has  not  this  grace  and  movement  ?  — 

A  CLASSICAL  CONTRAST 

I  have  (in  bronze)  a  tiny 

Adventuress  of  Greece, 
A  little  laughing  Phryne, 

Upon  my  mantelpiece, 
And  when  I  see  her  smiling 

Imagination  strays 
Once  more  in  brave,  beguiling, 

Divine  Athenian  days ! 

Cool  marble  courts  are  ringing 

As  merry  voices  call, 
Where  girls  are  garland-stringing 

For  Springtime's  festival ; 
In  lanes  of  linked  lightness 

The  roses  rope,  and  flow 
Blood-red  upon  the  whiteness 

Of  chiselled  Parian  snow  ! 

I  have  a  pot  of  pewter, 

And  when  the  firelight  gleams 
It  too  will  turn  transmuter 

Of  commonplace  to  dreams. 
Then,  though  the  year's  at  ember 

Once  more  high  June  doth  reign 
And  I  in  dreams  remember,  — 

And  win  the  thing  again  ! 

52 


"To  a  Chalk-Blue" 

On  turf  of  headland  thymy, 

Where  brine-washed  breezes  strive, 
I  lay  the  subtle  stymie, 

I  drive  the  spanking  drive ; 
I  see  the  grey  tides  sleeping, 

I  watch  the  grey  gulls  wheel, 
Till  through  the  dusk  come  creeping 

The  lights  of  distant  Deal ! 

0  pewter  and  O  Phryne, 
Since  both  of  you  may  bring 

Your  visions  blue  and  briny 
Or  garlanded  of  Spring : 

1  welcome  you  together 

Upon  my  mantelpiece, 
And  love  both  magics,  whether 
Of  England  or  of  Greece  ! 

As  an  example  of  Mr.  Chalmers's  happiness  of 
touch  and  joy  of  life  in  his  Nature-poems  take  these 
lines  "To  a  Chalk-Blue"  :  — 


Butterflies,  Butterflies,  delicate  downy  ones, 
Golden,  and  purple,  and  yellow  browny  ones, 
Whites,  reds,  and  tortoiseshells,  what's  in  a  hue  ? 
You're  worth  the  whole  lot  of  them,  little  Chalk-Blue  ! 

Fabled  Apollos,  of  bug-hunters'  hollow  tales, 
Camberwell  Beauties,  Large  Coppers,  and  Swallow-tails, 
They've   fled    from    high   farming,    they've    gone   down   the 

breeze, 
To  Elfland,  perhaps,  or  wherever  you  please. 

You,  Master  Blue,  hold  by  man  and  his  handiworks, 
Chalk-pits  and  cuttings,  and  engineers'  sandy  works, 
Sway  on  his  wheat-stalks,  most  buoyant  and  bold, 
A  turquoise  a-droop  on  a  chain  of  light  gold  ! 

53 


A  Good  Poet 

Here  was  your  home,  ere  the  Legion's  lean  warriors 

Laughed  at  the  slings  of  Druidical  quarriors, 

Or  ever  the  Eagles  came  swooping  ashore, 

You  flew  your  blue  ensign  from  Lizard  to  Nore  ! 

Long  may  you  linger  and  flourish  exceedingly, 
Dancing  the  sun  round  all  summer  unheedingly. 
Sprite  of  his  splendour,  small  priest  of  high  noon, 
Oh,  bold  little,  old  little  blue  bit  of  June  ! 

Could  that  particular  butterfly  have  been  more 
appropriately  celebrated  ?  Do  not  the  verses  almost 
suggest  its  flight  and  hue  ? 

You  notice  Mr.  Chalmers's  pretty  use  of  the  word 
"little."  How  many  times  he  uses  "little"  in 
this  volume  I  have  not  counted  to  see,  but  he 
knows  its  value  better  than  most.  There  is  an  ode 
to  Syrinx,  "Little  Lady  loved  of  Pan";  there  is  a 
gossamer  of  speculation  as  to  the  identity  of  the 
heroine  of  a  gardener's  legend  :  — 

I  like  to  fancy  most 

That  she  is  just  some  little  lady's  ghost 

Who  loved  her  flowers 

And  quiet  hours 

In  Junes  of  old  ; 

there  is  a  panegyric  on  "a  little  hound  of  Beel- 
zebub" ;  and  so  forth  —  all  made  the  more  attractive 
by  this  employment  of  an  affectionate  diminutive. 
And  there  is  this  charming  suburban  lyric  :  — 

Little  garden  gods, 

You  of  good  bestowing, 

You  of  kindly  showing 
Mid  the  pottings  and  the  pods, 

54 


"If  I  had  a  broomstick" 

Watchers  of  geranium  beds, 

Pinks  and  stocks  and  suchlike  orders, 
Rose,  and  sleepy  poppy-heads  — 

Bless  us  in  our  borders, 
Little  garden  gods ! 


Little  garden  gods, 

Bless  the  time  of  sowing, 

Watering,  and  growing ; 
Lastly,  when  our  sunflower  nods, 
And  our  rambler's  red  array 

Waits  the  honey-bee  her  labours, 
Bless  our  garden  that  it  may 

Beat  our  next-door  neighbour's, 
Little  garden  gods ! 

Finally,  here  is  a  specimen  of  Mr.  Chalmers  in  a 
more  serious  moment,  where  he  handles  a  pathetic 
theme  like  a  gentleman  :  — 

If  I  had  a  broomstick,  and  knew  how  to  ride  it, 
I'd  fly  through  the  windows  when  Jane  goes  to  tea, 
And  over  the  tops  of  the  chimneys  I'd  guide  it, 
To  lands  where  no  children  are  cripples  like  me ; 
I'd  run  on  the  rocks  with  the  crabs  and  the  sea, 
Where  soft  red  anemones  close  when  you  touch ; 
If  I  had  a  broomstick,  and  knew  how  to  ride  it, 
If  I  had  a  broomstick  —  instead  of  a  crutch  ! 

And  here  (for  there  is  a  limit  to  the  decent  eking  out 
of  one's  own  copper  with  other  men's  gold)  I  stop : 
whole-heartedly  commending  this  kindly,  happy,  and 
distinguished  spirit  to  you. 

Much  of  the  above  I  wrote  and  printed  during 
the  winter  of  1912,  just  after  Mr.  Chalmers's  book 

55 


A  Good  Poet 

was  published.  The  article  when  it  appeared  was 
read  by  a  very  literary  gent  of  my  acquaintance,  a 
pundit  famous  throughout  our  Sphere  for  his  critical 
judgments,  who  at  once  favoured  me  with  a  letter 
stating  that  he  had  looked  into  Green  Days  and  Blue 
Days  and  found  it  good,  but  not  poetry.  "Some  day," 
he  added,  "I  will  send  you  a  definition  of  poetry." 
That  day  has  not  yet  dawned ;  and  I  wonder  how 
I  can  wait  for  it.  But  meanwhile  let  me  say  again 
that  in  my  opinion  the  question  of  what  is  poetry 
can  be  answered  only  by  each  reader  for  himself.  No 
definition  framed  by  another  is  of  the  slightest  use, 
except  to  embarrass  young  people  at  examinations 
and  provide  instructors  with  the  dry  formulae  by 
which  they  live. 

"Poetry,"  said  a  famous  literary  theorist  the  other 
day,  "is  that  which  is  written  by  a  poet."  He  said  it 
as  a  joke,  but  it  is  far  more  to  the  point  than  "the  best 
words  in  the  best  order,"  and  other  of  the  classical 
phrases.  My  own  definition  would  be,  "Poetry  is 
what  I  cannot  write  myself" ;  but  for  more  universal 
application,  this  perhaps  is.  better:  "Poetry  is  that 
which  any  reader  finds  poetical,"  for  that  sets  the 
burden  on  individual  backs,  where  it  ought  to  be. 
Judged  by  this  test,  Mr.  Chalmers  is  for  me  a  very 
good  poet  indeed,  and,  like  Mr.  Dobson  and  Andrew 
Lang  and  Moira  O'Neill,  as  good  a  poet  as  anyone 
under  ordinary  conditions  ought  to  want ;  for  he 
touches  the  matters  of  daily  life  with  radiance,  and 
hangs  a  veil  of  romance  over  experience,  and  sends 
56 


The  Daily  Muse 

you  away  happy.  No  doubt  there  are  poets  who  have 
done  more  than  this,  and  in  rare  moods  one  craves 
their  society ;  but  Mr.  Chalmers  and  those  three  others 
are  more  daily  friends.  Meanwhile  that  definition  is 
still  to  arrive  ! 


57 


Wordsworth  Pour  Rire   <z>       <z>       <z*       <z> 

ANEW  Wordsworth  letter,  dated  November  17th, 
1844,  printed  recently,  protesting  against  the 
projected  railway  through  the  Vale  of  Winder- 
mere,  would  seem  to  have  been  called  forth  by  a 
footnote  to  the  poet's  sonnet  of  October  in  the 
same  year  beginning  — 

Is,  then,  no  nook  of  English  ground  secure  ? 
The  footnote  ran  thus  :  — 

The  degree  and  kind  of  attachment  which  many  of  the 
yeomanry  feel  to  their  small  inheritances  can  scarcely  be  over- 
rated. Near  the  house  of  one  of  them  stands  a  magnificent  tree, 
which  a  neighbour  of  the  owner  advised  him  to  fell  for  profit's 
sake.  "Fell  it !"  exclaimed  the  yeoman ;  "I  had  rather  fall  on 
my  knees  and  worship  it."  It  happens,  I  believe,  that  the  in- 
tended railway  would  pass  through  this  little  property,  and  I 
hope  that  an  apology  for  the  answer  will  not  be  thought  neces- 
sary by  one  who  enters  into  the  strength  of  the  feeling. 

In  the  new  letter  Wordsworth  adds  that  this  tree's 
owner,  Mr.  William  Birkett,  "furious  at  the  thought 
of  the  railway  going  through  his  property,"  is  pre- 
pared to  give  £1000  to  prevent  the  line. 

But    let    us    inquire    a    little    deeper.     Of    Words- 

58 


Localities  Alter  Cases 

worth's   four   railway   sonnets,   the   "Proud   were  ye, 
Mountains"  is  the  best  known  :  — 

Proud  were  ye,  Mountains,  when,  in  times  of  old, 
Your  patriot  sons,  to  stem  invasive  war, 
Intrenched  your  brows ;   ye  gloried  in  each  scar  : 
Now,  for  your  shame,  a  Power,  the  Thirst  of  Gold, 
That  rules  o'er  Britain  like  a  baneful  star, 
Wills  that  your  peace,  your  beauty,  shall  be  sold. 

That  was  in  1844.     Yet  see  how  the  poet  had  written 
to  Charles  Lloyd,  the  Birmingham  banker,  in  1825  :  — 

"To  come  to  the  point  at  once,  I  have  been  led 
to  consider  Birmingham  as  the  point  from  which  the 
railway  companies  now  forming  receive  their  princi- 
pal impulse,  and  I  feel  disposed  to  risk  a  sum  —  not 
more  than  £500  —  in  purchasing  shares  in  some 
promising  company  or  companies.  I  do  not  wish  to 
involve  you  in  the  responsibility  of  advising  an  in- 
vestment of  this  kind,  but  I  hope  I  do  not  presume 
too  much  when  I  request  that  you  would  have  the 
kindness  to  point  out  to  me  what  companies  are 
thought  the  most  eligible,  adding  directions  as  to 
the  mode  of  proceeding  in  case  I  determine  upon 
purchasing." 

The  late  J.  K.  S.,  it  will  be  remembered,  desiring 
once  again  to  parody  Wordsworth,  took  the  railway 
theme  and  (knowing  nothing  of  the  above  letter) 
produced  his  piquant  lines  on  "The  Insufficiency  of 
Steam  Locomotion  in  the  Lake  District,"  of  which 
here  are  two  stanzas  :  — 

59 


Wordsworth  Pour  Rire 

Bright  Summer  spreads  his  various  hue 

O'er  nestling  vales  and  mountains  steep, 
Glad  birds  are  singing  in  the  blue, 

In  joyous  chorus  bleat  the  sheep. 
But  men  are  walking  to  and  fro, 

Are  riding,  driving,  far  and  near, 
And  nobody  as  yet  can  go 

By  train  to  Buttermere. 

Wake,  England,  wake  !  'tis  now  the  hour 

To  sweep  away  this  black  disgrace  — 
The  want  of  locomotive  power 

In  so  enjoyable  a  place. 
Nature  has  done  her  part,  and  why 

Is  mightier  man  in  his  to  fail  ? 
I  want  to  hear  the  porters  cry : 

"Change  here  for  Ennerdale  !" 

One  does  not  draw  attention  to  the  inconsistency 
of  Rydal  Mount  from  any  petty  motive,  but  merely 
as  an  illustration  of  how  pleasantly  vulnerable  our 
greatest  may  be.  Wordsworth,  also,  it  might  be 
held,  owes  us  a  laugh  now  and  then.  In  his  lifetime 
he  pleaded  guilty  to  only  one  conscious  joke,  and 
when  a  man  of  advanced  age  who  so  understood  his 
lowlier  neighbours  does  that,  we  must  find  jokes  for 
him.  His  joke,  by  the  way,  was  this.  He  had  been 
walking,  he  said,  when  a  carter  stopped  him  with 
the  question,  "Have  you  seen  my  wife?"  And 
what  was  the  poet's  gravity -removing  reply?  "My 
dear  sir,"  he  answered,  "I  did  not  even  know  that 
you  had  a  wife."  That  is  not  exactly  in  the  accept- 
able manner  of  George  Graves ;  but  it  will  do. 
Providence,  however,  came  in  and  made  it  better ; 
60 


A  Joke's  Epilogue 

for  the  American  critic,  William  Winter,  when  a 
small  boy,  was  taken  to  Rydal  by  his  father  on  a 
devout  pilgrimage  to  the  Mount.  While  the  elders 
sat  in  the  garden,  the  little  Winter  was  sent  out  to 
the  poet  with  a  message.  "Please,  sir,"  said  he  to 
the  author  of  "The  Excursion,"  "your  wife  wants 
you."  "You  shouldn't  say  'your  wife,'"  replied  the 
poet  reprovingly;  "you  should  say  'Mrs.  Words- 
worth.'" "But  she  is  your  wife,  isn't  she?"  was 
the  answer  of  astonished  Young  America. 

And  now  for  the  very  cream  of  Wordsworth's 
career  as  a  humorist,  which  has  been  sent  to  me  by 
that  inspired  investigator  of  out-of-the-way  printed 
matter,  Mr.  Bertram  Dobell.  It  consists  of  a  short 
article  from  the  Illustrated  London  News  of  Feb- 
ruary 10th,  1855,  and  if  anyone  can  read  it  aloud 
without  collapse  I  envy  his  self-control.  The  con- 
scious funny  man  never  wrote  anything  that  to  my 
mind  is  droller.  It  runs  thus  :  — 

"Our  notice  last  week  of  the  sister  of  William 
Wordsworth  has  afforded  us  an  opportunity  of 
hearing  from  the  lips  of  a  true  poet  an  account  of  a 
visit  which  he  made  to  Wordsworth.  His  story  is 
in  every  way  characteristic  of  the  great  author  of 
4  The  Excursion ' ;  and  we  have  our  friend's  per- 
mission to  tell  it,  but  are  not  at  liberty  to  mention 
his  name :  — 

"In  the  summer  of  1846,  when  on  a  visit  to  the 
Lake  District,  I  called  upon  Mr.  Wordsworth,  to  con- 
vey a  message  from  his  daughter,  then  in  London. 
61 


Wordsworth  Pour  Rire 

He  received  me  with  a  kindly  shake  of  the  hand. 
'  I  am  told,'  said  he,  '  that  you  write  poetry ;  but 
I  never  read  a  line  of  your  compositions,  and  I  don't 
intend.'  I  suppose  I  must  have  looked  surprised, 
for  he  added,  before  I  could  find  time  to  reply, 
'You  must  not  think  me  rude  in  this,  for  I  never 
read  anybody's  poetry  but  my  own,  and  haven't  done 
so  for  five-and-twenty  years.'  Doubtless  I  smiled. 
'You  may  think  this  is  vanity,  but  it  is  not;  for  I 
only  read  my  own  poetry  to  correct  its  faults,  and 
make  it  as  good  as  I  can.' 

"I  endeavoured  to  change  the  subject  by  some 
general  remarks  on  the  beauty  of  the  scenery  visible 
from  his  garden,  in  which  our  interview  had  taken 
place.  '  What  is  the  name  of  that  mountain  ? '  I 
inquired.  'God  bless  me,'  he  said,  'have  you  not 
read  my  poems  ?  Why,  that's  Nab-Scar.  There  are 
frequent  allusions  to  it  in  my  writings.  Don't  you 
remember  the  lines  ? '  and  he  repeated  in  a  clear, 
distinct  voice  a  well-known  passage  from  'The 
Excursion.' 

"The  name  of  Southey  having  been  accidentally 
mentioned,  I  inquired  as  a  matter  of  literary  history 
whether,  as  was  commonly  believed,  he  had  im- 
paired his  health  and  his  intellect  by  too  much 
mental  exertion,  and  thus  brought  on  that  com- 
parative darkness  of  mind  which  clouded  the  last 
months  of  his  life.  'By  no  means,'  said  Wordsworth; 
'Southey  was  a  most  methodical  worker.  He 
systematized  his  time.  He  was  never  confused  or  in 
62 


"Mr.  Laman  Blanchard" 

a  hurry,  and  got  through  a  deal  of  labour  with  an 
amount  of  ease  and  comfort  which  your  hurry-scurry 
kind  of  people  can  neither  accomplish  nor  under- 
stand. The  truth  is  —  at  least,  I  think  so  —  that  his 
mind  was  thrown  off  its  balance  by  the  death  of  his 
first  wife,  and  never  afterwards  wholly  recovered 
itself.' 

"I  reminded  him  at  this  point  that  the  late  Mr. 
Laman  Blanchard,  whose  sad  story  was  then  fresh  in 
the  recollection  of  the  public,  had  been  reduced  to 
a  state  of  insanity  by  a  similar  bereavement.  From 
that  moment  my  name  seemed  to  fade  away  from 
Mr.  Wordsworth's  recollection,  and  he  always  ad- 
dressed me  during  the  remainder  of  our  interview 
as  Mr.  Laman  Blanchard.  His  sister,  Miss  Words- 
worth, was  wheeled  into  the  garden  in  a  little 
garden-carriage,  or  chair,  impelled  by  Mrs.  Words- 
worth. I  wore  on  my  head  a  Glengarry  travelling- 
cap,  with  a  sprig  of  heather ;  and  Miss  Wordsworth 
no  sooner  caught  sight  of  me  than  she  exclaimed  in 
a  shrill  voice,  'Who's  that  man,  brother?'  'Oh, 
nobody,  my  dear,'  he  replied.  'It's  only  Mr. 
Laman  Blanchard.'  I  gently  hinted  my  right  name. 
'It's  all  the  same  to  her,  poor  thing,'  he  re- 
joined. 

"He  would  possibly  have  added  more,  but  the 
unfortunate  lady  interrupted  him  by  commencing  to 
sing  the  well-known  Scotch  song  — 

A  Highland  lad  my  love  was  born, 
The  Lowland  laws  he  held  in  scorn. 

63 


Wordsworth  Pour  Rire 

She  sang  one  verse  with  much  correctness,  and  was 
commencing  another  when  Mr.  Wordsworth  led  me 
away.  'This  is  a  painful  scene,  Mr.  Blanchard,'  he 
said ;  '  let  us  go  into  my  room,  and  I  will  read  you 
some  more  passages  from  my  poems  about  Nab- 
Scar.'  " 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema  ^>        *o        ^>        ^>y 

[A  paper  read  at  Norwich  on  May  5th,  1913,  in  aid 
of  a  fund  to  repair  the  roof  of  St.  George's  Church, 
Colegate,  where  Crome  is  buried.] 

I  SUPPOSE  that  every  painter,  except  here  and 
there  a  Diogenes,  admits  to  a  favourite  among 
earlier  craftsmen.  Even  Michael  Angelo,  command- 
ing and  innovating  as  he  was,  delighted  in  Luca 
Signorelli ;  even  the  jealous  and  self-sufficing  Turner 
confessed  that  Albert  Cuyp  excited  him  to  envy; 
while  Wilson  worshipped  Claude ;  and  in  our  own 
day,  as  I  have  heard,  Mr.  Sargent  steals  often  away 
across  the  North  Sea  to  Haarlem  to  make  copies  of 
the  most  carelessly  masterly  of  all  the  masters,  Frans 
Hals  himself. 

John  Crome's  darling  was  also  a  Dutchman  —  the 
landscape  painter  Hobbema. 

Every   one   must   have   heard   how   the   old   genial 

landscapist  as  he  lay  dying  and  now  and  then  making 

with  his  hands  the  motions  of  painting  a  picture,  to 

an  accompaniment  of  satisfied   murmuring,   used  his 

F  65 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

latest  breath  in  extolling  his  idol.  "Hobbema,  my 
dear  Hobbema,"  he  exclaimed  as  the  light  faded 
for  ever,  "how  I  have  loved  you  !"  and  so  was  dead. 

If  this  be  a  true  story,  his  famous  dying  injunc- 
tion to  his  son  to  dignify  whatever  he  painted  —  "If 
your  subject  is  only  a  pigsty,  my  boy,  dignify  it" 
came  earlier. 

Be  that  as  it  may,  we  can  feel  certain  that  the 
passionate  farewell  to  Hobbema  is  authentic;  and  it 
is  because,  in  this  city  and  in  this  house  1  (which  has 
so  many  Cromes,  and  even  his  palette),  to  say  new 
things  about  John  Crome  himself  would  be  so 
arduous  a  task,  if  not  an  impossible  one,  that  I 
thought  of  turning  the  lantern  rather  upon  Crome's 
Hobbema  and  Hobbema's  Ruysdael  as  an  ingenious 
diversion,  which  would  at  the  same  time  have 
genealogical  propriety.  For  though  we  are  all  too 
sensible,  I  hope,  to  talk  of  imitators,  the  fact  remains, 
that  before  Hobbema  there  was  Jacob,  or  the  great, 
Ruysdael,  and  before  Crome,  Hobbema;  and  what 
would  have  happened  to  hundreds  of  living  and 
recent  landscape  painters  both  English  and  French 
had  there  been  no  Crome,  we  need  not  stop  to 
conjecture.  For  the  House  of  Art,  though  it  has 
many  mansions,  is  built  of  stones  joined  together 
in  such  interdependence  that  it  would  hardly  be 
possible  to  withdraw  one  without  serious  and  far- 
reaching  disturbance. 

Whatever    Crome   gained    from    his    darling  —  and 
1  Crown  Point,  the  residence  of  Mr.  Russell  Colman. 

66 


"The  English  Hobbema" 

most  likely  it  was  direction  and  enthusiasm  more 
than  anything  else  —  when  as  a  lad  he  borrowed  from 
Thomas  Harvey  of  Catton  a  picture  by  Hobbema 
to  copy,  he  never  achieved  the  indignity  of  being 
called,  after  a  bad  habit  of  which  art  critics  are  too 
fond,  "The  English  Hobbema,"  although,  according 
to  Dawson  Turner  of  Yarmouth,  the  banker  and  anti- 
quary and  one  of  Crome's  patrons,  he  panted  for  it. 
Turner  tells  us  that  to  wear  that  label  —  to  be  known 
near  and  far  as  "The  English  Hobbema" — would 
have  been  the  summit  of  Crome's  ambition ;  and 
Turner  certainly  ought  to  know,  for  he  and  Crome 
were  intimate  (although  not  so  intimate  as  he  and 
Cotman),  and  it  was  he  who  acquired  Harvey's 
example  of  Hobbema  and  included  a  drawing  of  it, 
together  with  several  Cronies,  in  his  Outlines  in  Lithog- 
raphy, in  1840,  a  book  which  is  the  principal  source 
of  biographical  information  concerning  Crome. 

The  Hobbema  which  Crome  copied  is  there  dis- 
covered to  be  a  typical  wooded  scene,  very  like 
No.  995  in  the  National  Gallery  —  a  cottage  on  the 
right,  peasants  in  the  road,  and  leaves  and  branches 
over  all.  Dawson  Turner  bought  it  in  1815,  and  at 
his  sale  it  passed  to  Lord  Scarsbrick.  I  have  not 
been  able  to  trace  its  present  abode. 

The  critics,  however,  although  they  let  Crome 
escape  them,  did  not  completely  fail  in  fixing  their 
facile  label  somewhere ;  and  it  was  poor  Patrick 
Nasmyth  who  had  to  wear  it.  As  "The  English 
Hobbema"  he  was  and  is  known. 
67 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

In  any  case,  Crome  can  never  have  it  now,  for 
enough  time  has  passed  to  make  it  clear  as  crystal 
that  he  was  not  the  English  Hobbema  any  more 
than  Hobbema  was  the  Dutch  Crome,  but  gloriously 
and  eternally  he  was  the  English  Crome. 

And,  to  revert  for  a  moment  to  Patrick  Nasmyth, 
neither  was  he  the  English  Hobbema,  although  often 
very  near  it,  but  a  sincere  individuality  in  art  with  a 
passion  for  Nature  not  less  true  than  Crome's  own, 
and  other  points  of  resemblance,  including  a  kindred 
liking  for  the  social  glass,  neither  of  them  being  in 
the  least  attracted  by  the  frigid  allurements  of 
teetotalism.  Nasmyth  also  came  by  his  premature 
death  in  a  manner  only  too  similar  to  that  of  his  great 
Norwich  contemporary ;  for  whereas  Crome  caught 
his  fatal  chill  while  painting  a  water  frolic,  Nasmyth 
caught  his  while  painting  some  pollarded  willows  by 
the  Thames.  And  while  Crome  in  extremis  called 
upon  Hobbema  in  that  fine  rapture,  Nasmyth's  last 
words,  as  he  sat  propped  up  in  bed  to  watch  a 
thunderstorm,  were :  "How  glorious  it  is  !" 

A  little  more  about  Harvey  and  Crome  and 
Dawson  Turner  before  we  cross  the  North  Sea. 
I  cannot  find  out  as  much  of  Thomas  Harvey  of 
Catton  as  I  should  like ;  and  I  regret  this,  since 
a  study  of  the  earliest  patrons  of  genius  is  as  well 
worth  making  as  any.  The  later  ones  are  less 
important. 

Harvey  was  both  a  pioneer  and  a  friend  in  need, 
for  he  befriended  Crome  when  that  youth  required 
68 


Thomas  Harvey 

encouragement  and  the  stimulus  of  being  discovered. 
Crome  was  then  a  hobbledehoy  painting  carriage- 
wheels  for  Francis  Whisler  in  Bethel  Street,  and 
sometimes  a  house,  and  sometimes  a  signboard,  and 
even,  according  to  Turner,  now  and  then  painting 
Cupids,  and  hearts  with  darts  through  them,  on 
sweetmeats  for  a  Norwich  confectioner. 

I  wonder  if  it  had  before  occurred  to  you  that 
these  things  demanded  an  artist.  I  confess  that  it 
had  not  to  me.  But  of  course  they  do,  just  as,  I 
suppose,  those  circular  sweets  with  mottoes  or  pro- 
testations of  affection  upon  them  demand  not  only  an 
author  but  a  compositor  and  printer,  and  for  all  I 
know  a  proof-reader  too. 

Possibly,  indeed,  if  not  probably,  while  Crome 
was  painting  his  confectionery,  his  friend,  and  after- 
wards painting  partner  and  brother-in-law,  Robert 
Ladbroke,  was  actually  engaged  in  printing  such 
sweets,  for  it  was  as  a  printer  that  he  began  his 
career.  According  to  Dawson  Turner,  Ladbroke's 
artistic  enthusiasm  did  much  to  kindle  Crome's. 

Thomas  Harvey  of  Catton  was  a  man  of  wealth 
and  something  of  an  amateur  artist,  as  we  know  by 
his  leaving  behind  him  fifty  etchings  of  cattle.  But 
he  was  more  of  a  connoisseur,  and  he  was  the 
possessor  of  a  small  collection  of  good  pictures, 
including  a  Hobbema  and  Gainsborough's  famous 
"Cottage  Door,"  and  he  allowed  Crome  to  copy  all 
of  these. 

The  second  son  of  Thomas  Harvey,  a  wool 
69 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

merchant,  Mayor  of  Norwich  in  1748,  whose  portrait 
is  in  St.  Andrew's  "Hall,  Mr.  Harvey  married  Lydia 
Twiss,  daughter  of  an  English  merchant  living  in 
Rotterdam.  Hence  perhaps  his  interest  in  Dutch 
painting. 

One  of  his  brothers-in-law  was  Richard  Twiss,  who 
wrote  Travels  in  Portugal,  Spain,  Ireland  and  France, 
which  had  some  vogue  in  their  day.  Another 
brother-in-law  was  Francis  Twiss,  author  of  an  Index 
to  Shakespeare  and  the  husband  of  Mrs.  Siddons's 
sister,  Francis  Kemble,  and  these  were  the  parents 
of  a  minor  wit  and  man  about  town  named  Horace 
Twiss,  whose  good  things  were  in  everybody's  mouth 
in  the  first  half  of  the  last  century. 

Thomas  Harvey  died  in  1819.  He  not  only  en- 
couraged Crome  by  putting  his  pictures  at  his  dis- 
posal, but  introduced  him  both  to  Opie,  who  later 
painted  the  fine  portrait  of  Crome  now  in  the 
Castle  Gallery  here,  and  to  Beechey  (afterwards 
Sir  William),  who  had  come  to  Norwich  to  court  a 
miniature  painter ;  and  Beechey,  when  Crome  went 
to  London  for  a  brief  period,  let  him  use  his  studio 
there,  and  was  generally  useful  and  stimulating. 

To  Harvey,  then,  all  praise  is  due  from  every  lover 
of  John  Crome. 

The  later  patron,  Dawson  Turner,  was  younger 
than  Crome  by  seven  years  and  survived  him  for 
nearly  forty.  Interesting  as  are  his  recollections  of 
the  artist  in  the  Outlines  in  Lithography,  they  are 
impaired  by  the  author's  high  estimation  of  himself. 
70 


Early  Vicissitudes 

• 

The  reader  feels  that  the  principal  motive  of  the 
publication  was  to  illustrate  the  extent  of  Turner's 
culture.  His  taste,  however,  was  sound  enough,  for 
in  1840  he  had  eleven  Cromes,  the  best  of  which 
was  the  incomparably  beautiful  "Moonrise  at  the 
Mouth  of  the  Yare,"  now  in  the  National  Gallery, 
one  of  the  Salting  pictures.  What  Mr.  Salting  gave 
for  it  I  do  not  know,  but  at  Turner's  sale  in  1852  it 
was  allowed  to  go  for  £30,  10s. 

Certain  of  Dawson  Turner's  statements  I  think 
we  may  doubt,  as  when  he  tells  us  that  Crome  had 
early  difficulties  of  a  "truly  appalling  kind,"  and 
hardships  and  trials  "such  as  few  have  been  able  to 
overcome."  The  evidence  is  far  from  clear.  It  is 
not  enough  to  say  that  the  youthful  Crome  had  to 
"resort  to  his  mother's  aprons  and  to  the  very 
ticking  of  his  bed  for  canvas,"  for  if  we  are  to  be 
harrowed  by  such  proceedings  as  that,  what  can  our 
feelings  be  with  regard  to  Benjamin  West's  cat, 
from  whose  body,  for  his  earliest  paint-brushes,  he 
plucked  the  living  hair  ?  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
Turner  tells  us,  Crome  made  brushes  from  the  same 
material ;  but  he  had  the  sagacity  (or  humanity, 
since  charity  begins  at  home)  to  employ  not  the 
family  cat,  but  the  landlord's,  and  he  did  not  wrench 
his  booty,  but  clipped  it. 

But  was  there  much  privation  here  ?  All 
children  who  express  a  powerful  desire  to  paint 
do  not  develop  into  masters,  and  Mrs.  Crome  was 
too  poor  to  afford  to  gratify  her  son's  whim  by  more 

71 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

direct  methods.     A  little  hardship  does  no  boy  any 
harm,  and  especially  so  if  he  is  to  be  a  genius. 

All  that  we  know  for  certain  is  that  Crome  was  of 
needy  stock  and  that  he  did  certain  odd  jobs  before 
he  could  get  rightfully  to  work  as  a  painter  of 
pictures ;  while  we  know,  too,  that  in  later  life, 
seated  comfortably  at  his  inn,  of  an  evening,  with 
plenty  and  admiration  surrounding  him,  he  liked  to 
tell  about  his  early  struggles ;  but  it  is  doubtful 
if  those  struggles  were  very  serious,  and  we  are  all 
aware  of  what  a  temptation  it  is  to  the  self-made 
man  to  exaggerate  the  difficulties  of  his  task. 
Human  nature  has  few  more  attractive  foibles. 

My  own  feeling  is  that,  such  as  they  were,  Crome's 
privations  were  all  over  before  he  was  well  in  his 
teens.  After  that  he  was  lucky  :  lucky  in  meeting 
his  partner  and  brother-in-law  Ladbroke,  lucky  in 
meeting  Harvey  and  Opie  and  Beechey,  and  luckiest 
when  such  a  highly  respected,  important  gentleman 
as  John  Gurney  of  Earlham  engaged  him  to  teach 
his  brood  of  seven  Quaker  daughters,  among  them 
that  Betsy  Gurney  who  afterwards  became  Elizabeth 
Fry,  when  it  must  have  been  fairly  known  in 
Norwich  that  Crome's  eldest  child  was  born  only 
three  weeks  after  its  parents'  marriage. 

The  only  piece  of  really  poignant  misfortune  that 
I  can  find  about  Crome  is  the  refusal  of  the  landlord 
of  the  "Leg  of  Mutton,"  for  whom  he  had  painted 
a  signboard,  to  pay  for  it.  Crome  had  painted  it 
raw  and  the  landlord  wanted  it  cooked. 
72 


J.   M.  W.  Turner 

Allan  Cunningham  (who  did  not,  however,  include 
Crome  in  his  British  Painters)  divides  the  responsi- 
bility for  his  culture  very  exactly.  It  was,  he  tells 
us,  with  John  Gurney  of  Earlham,  among  the 
Lakes,  that  Crome  "felt  his  notions  of  landscape 
painting  expand";  while  it  was  with  Dawson  Turner 
that  the  young  painter  "conversed  on  art,  on  litera- 
ture, and  other  matters  of  purity  and  excellence." 
Dawson  Turner,  we  may  feel  sure,  was  ready  to 
oblige  with  any  amount  of  such  talk. 

Cunningham,  however,  was  not  an  inspired  biog- 
rapher or  critic,  for  after  an  excellent  passage 
emphasizing  Crome's  love  and  knowledge  of  Nature, 
he  undoes  his  praise  with  a  concluding  sentence 
that  was  meant  to  clinch  all,  but  fails  rather  miser- 
ably. "With  Crome,"  he  says,  "an  ash  hung  with 
its  silver  keys  was  different  from  an  oak  covered 
with  acorns." 

The  most  interesting  thing  that  Dawson  Turner 
tells  us  is  that  Crome  returned  from  one  of  his 
later  annual  visits  to  London  with  his  whole  soul 
aglow  with  admiration  of  the  great  Turner's  land- 
scapes at  the  Royal  Academy.  Since  Crome  died  in 
the  spring  of  1821,  this  remark  refers  probably  to 
1818,  19,  or  20.  In  1818  Turner  exhibited  "Raby 
Castle,"  "The  Packet  Boat  from  Rotterdam  to  Dort 
becalmed,"  and  "The  Field  of  Waterloo";  in  1819, 
"The  Entrance  to  the  Meuse"  and  "Richmond  Hill 
on  the  Prince  Regent's  Birthday " ;  and  in  1820, 
"Raphael  accompanied  by  La  Fornarina  preparing 

73 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

his  pictures  for  the  decoration  of  the  Loggia  of  the 
Vatican."  I  expect  it  was  either  the  Dort  packet- 
boat  or  the  Meuse  which  particularly  delighted 
Crome. 

In  all  his  career  Crome  sent  only  fourteen  pictures 
to  the  Academy,  having  the  Norwich  Society's  Ex- 
hibitions to  supply  first,  and  how  the  great  Turner 
considered  these,  or  if  he  looked  at  them  at  all, 
we  do  not  know.  But  apart  from  his  natural  scent 
for  a  rival,  Turner  should  have  been  interested  by 
Crome,  for  Crome  could  get  very  near  that  golden 
light  which  Turner,  standing  once  before  a  picture 
by  Cuyp,  said  he  would  give  £1000  to  reproduce. 

Turner  and  Crome  had  much  in  common.  Not 
only  had  both  imitated  Wilson  in  their  time,  but 
both  were  devoted  to  Cuyp,  and  Turner,  whatever 
he  may  have  felt  about  Hobbema,  had  such  an 
admiration  for  Jacob  Ruysdael,  Hobbema's  master, 
that  he  whimsically  gave  the  name  of  Ruysdael  to  a 
Dutch  seaport  in  one  of  his  National  Gallery  pic- 
tures —  purely  out  of  homage. 

Little  enough  is  known  of  any  Dutch  painter, 
and  less  of  Crome's  Hobbema  than  most.  In  that 
wonderful  seventeenth  century  of  pictorial  genius, 
Holland  seems  to  have  been  so  rich  in  artists  that 
they  ceased  to  be  remarkable,  and  it  is  a  question 
if,  had  a  Dutch  Dictionary  of  National  Biography 
been  in  course  of  preparation,  artists  would  have 
got  in  it  at  all. 

Gerard   Dou   might   have   been   there,   for   he   was 

74 


Meindert  Hobbema 

in  great  demand  among  collectors,  and  no  doubt 
Vandyck,  for  his  aristocratic  connexions  at  the 
English  Court ;  but  I  doubt  if  Rembrandt  would 
have  been  under  R,  and  I  am  certain  that  you 
would  have  looked  in  vain  under  H  for  one  Mein- 
dert Hobbema.  Because  Meindert  Hobbema  ceased 
earlier  than  most  to  be  a  painter,  and  during  his 
painting  years  was  hardly  known  at  all  by  the  public, 
although  he  had  many  friends  amongst  artists. 

So  far  as  the  records  go,  he  was  born  at  Amster- 
dam or  Koeverden  (or  even  Middelharnis)  in  1638, 
at  a  time  when  England  was  excited  by  the  case  of 
John  Hampden  and  the  ship  money,  and  when  a 
famous  physician  named  Thomas  Browne,  who  is  one 
of  the  glories  of  this  city,  was  thirty-three. 

It  is  conjectured  that  Hobbema's  first  master  was 
Salomon  Ruysdael,  uncle  of  the  more  famous  Jacob 
and  himself  a  fine  landscape  painter.  Salomon's 
exact  dates  are  as  elusive  as  those  of  most  of  his 
artist  contemporaries ;  but  we  may  take  it  that  by 
1655,  when  Hobbema  wrould  be  fifteen,  the  master 
was  approaching  his  sixtieth  year,  while  his  nephew 
Jacob  was  then  a  young  man  in  the  middle  twenties. 

Salomon  was  true  to  Haarlem,  that  pleasant 
Dutch  city  whose  vast  church  rises  like  a  mammoth 
from  the  plain  in  so  many  of  Jacob's  pictures,  and 
we  may  suppose  that  Hobbema  lived  there  too 
during  his  pupilage.  Most  probably  he  passed  from 
Salomon  to  Jacob.  It  is  known  at  any  rate  that 
Jacob  was  both  a  friend  and  an  influence. 

75 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

Hobbema  could  not  have  had  a  better  friend,  for 
Ruysdael,  as  henceforward  Jacob  shall  be  called 
(his  uncle  Salomon  now  receding  to  the  background), 
was  a  man  of  great  kindness  of  heart  and  fidelity, 
and  we  may  be  certain  that  he  followed  painting 
with  a  passionate  devotion,  although  when  quite  a 
boy  he  is  said  to  have  wished  to  be  a  doctor  and 
even  to  have  spent  some  time  in  medical  studies. 
And  here  a  comparison  with  Crome  is  suggested,  al- 
though to  set  it  up  would  be  going  too  far;  yet  the 
fact  remains  that  two  years  of  Crome's  boyhood  were 
given  to  running  errands  for  Dr.  Rigby  of  Norwich, 
and  during  this  period  he  was  sufficiently  advanced 
on  the  road  at  any  rate  towards  empiricism  as  to 
amuse  himself  by  changing  the  labels  on  the 
medicine  bottles,  very  much  as  Mr.  Bob  Sawyer's 
boy  might  have  done ;  but  once,  it  is  known,  he  had 
(in  the  doctor's  absence)  enough  courage  and  address 
to  bleed  a  patient  almost  to  death. 

It  is  probable  that  Ruysdael  was  taught  by  his 
uncle,  before  medical  ambition  took  him,  but  Allart 
van  Everdingen,  who  was  glibly  called  "  The  Salvator 
Rosa  of  the  North,"  is  said  also  to  have  been  his 
master.  Everdingen  had  had  the  advantage,  very 
unusual  with  Dutch  artists,  of  being  shipwrecked  on 
the  coast  of  Norway,  and  while  in  that  land  he  had 
seen  and  admired  such  waterfalls  as  his  pupil 
Ruysdael  (whose  name  oddly  enough  signifies  foam- 
ing water)  was  to  become  so  famous  for  depicting. 

Such,  then,  was  Ruysdael  and  his  early  career. 
76 


Dutch  Influences 

Before  continuing  the  brief  outline  —  all  we 
can  discover  —  of  Hobbema's  life,  let  us  for  a 
moment  return  to  the  engaging  subject,  started  a 
little  while  back,  of  the  relationship  of  artist  to 
artist.  We  first  heard  our  own  Crome  exclaiming, 
"Hobbema,  my  dear  Hobbema !"  We  have  now 
seen  Hobbema  in  Salomon  Ruysdael's  painting- 
room  ;  just  as,  years  earlier,  Salomon  himself  had 
studied  in  the  painting-room  of  Jan  van  Goyen, 
whose  golden  placid  seas  and  golden  serene  rivers 
light  up  so  graciously  whatever  rooms  they  occupy. 

Now,  that  Norfolk  gentleman  and  Crome's  patron 
whose  name  cannot  be  too  deeply  carved  on  a 
cornice  of  the  House  of  Art,  Thomas  Harvey  of 
Catton,  had  an  example  not  only  of  Hobbema  but  of 
Van  Goyen  for  the  young  sign-painter  to  copy  and 
adore.  And  though  the  glory  that  is  Crome  would, 
as  I  hold,  always  have  been  the  glory  that  is  Crome, 
yet  there  is  no  harm  in  believing  that  he  would 
not  have  paid  quite  such  loving  attention  to  the 
trunk  and  foliage  of  the  Poringland  oak  but  for 
Hobbema,  or  have  bathed  Mousehold  Heath  in 
quite  such  a  lovely  aureous  light  but  for  Van  Goyen. 

Let  me  add  that  in  the  list  of  that  sale  of  Crome's 
possessions  which  was  held  at  Norwich  in  September 
1821  are  a  Hobbema,  a  Ruysdael,  a  Van  Goyen,  a 
Van  de  Velde,  and  a  Cuyp;  but  since  the  Hobbema 
fetched  only  thirty-six  shillings  and  the  Van  Goyen 
only  five  guineas,  it  is  conjectured  that  they  were 
not  the  originals  but  probably  Crome's  early  copies. 

77 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

To-day,  however,  what  would  not  some  of  us  give 
to  have  the  chance  of  buying  even  those  ? 

One  more  allusion  to  the  associated  elements  of 
the  House  of  Art  before  Hobbema  again  claims  us. 

In  the  National  Gallery  is  an  example  of  his  master 
Salomon  which,  in  Sir  Edward  Cook's  catalogue, 
has  only  one  quoted  reference  to  it.  But  how  do  you 
think  that  reference  runs  ?  It  is  from  a  writer  in 
the  Quarterly  Review,  who  finds  in  it  "a  peculiarly 
sharp,  clear,  and  firm  touch,  very  like  that  of  Stark." 
Now  Salomon,  in  the  seventeenth  century,  taught 
Hobbema,  who  was  Crome's  darling ;  and  James 
Stark  of  Norwich  was  articled  to  John  Crome  of  the 
same  city  in  1811,  for  three  years,  to  be  instructed 
in  the  art  and  mystery  of  painting  English  landscape. 
When  I  add  that,  in  Mr.  Binyon's  phrase,  the  truth 
of  which  you  may  easily  prove  by  a  visit  to  the 
Castle  Gallery  and  by  certain  of  the  examples  in 
this  house,  "Stark  was  more  faithful  to  Hobbema 
than  Crome  was,"  you  will  see  in  what  labyrinths 
the  students  of  derivatives  in  art  are  liable  to  find 
themselves. 

Supposing  that  Hobbema  began  to  paint  inde- 
pendently at  the  age  of  twenty,  we  will  put  1658 
as  the  year  of  his  emancipation.  Ruysdael,  who  by 
this  time  was  probably  his  principal  companion,  was 
then  nearing  thirty,  and  it  may  be  that  they  moved 
to  Amsterdam  together  about  that  time.  Ruysdael 
was  to  make  that  city  his  headquarters  until  1681, 
Hobbema  for  ever.  From  Amsterdam  they  had  of 
78 


Holland's  Celebrants 

course  to  make  journeys  in  search  of  their  own 
delectable  scenery.  Hobbema's  subjects  were  drawn 
chiefly  from  Gelderland,  where  trees  abound,  and 
where  Ruysdael  must  often  have  gone  too,  judging 
by  the  similarity  of  certain  of  their  pictures. 

Ruysdael  is  credited  also  with  more  extended 
travels,  as  far  south  as  Italy  and  as  far  north  as 
Scandinavia,  but  nothing  is  known  for  certain, 
save  that  many  of  his  landscapes  are  not  Dutch. 
Who,  however,  shall  say  that  he  did  not  find  many 
of  them  in  the  mind's  eye  —  a  source  of  inspiration 
which  even  the  most  realistic  painters  have  not 
at  times  disdained  ?  But  a  study  of  Hobbema's 
work  —  and  at  the  National  Gallery  there  are  eight 
examples  for  the  student  —  leads  one  to  the  belief 
that  he  painted  only  what  he  saw. 

A  concise  comparison  between  the  two  friends 
would  call  Ruysdael  the  more  poetical,  Hobbema 
the  more  natural.  Between  them  they  accounted 
for  most  of  the  moods  of  the  skies,  the  water,  and 
the  soil  of  their  beloved  Holland. 

One  feels  in  the  presence  of  all  Hobbema's  work 
that  he  kept  closely  to  the  fact.  Whatever  he 
painted,  surely  was  like  that,  we  say.  And  we  can 
derive  the  broad  facts  of  his  character  as  we  stand 
before  it.  A  plain,  straightforward  man,  fond  of 
clarity,  simplicity,  and  the  familiar ;  unambitious ; 
not  too  gay,  although  not  seriously  discontented ; 
expecting  little  of  life.  Such  we  may  safely  infer 
from  his  very  similar  canvases  painted  so  carefully 

79 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

but   without  •  joy,  always   under   similar   atmospheric 
conditions. 

We  miss  alike  the  variety,  the  strength  and 
experimentalism  of  Ruysdael  and  the  benignancy 
and  full-bloodedness  of  Crome.  But  how  exquisite 
is  Hobbema's  work  and  how  minute  his  enjoyment 
in  Nature  !  His  love  of  trees,  and  particularly  the 
oak,  amounted  to  a  passion.  He  rejoiced  in  foliage, 
never  abashed  by  difficulties  of  translating  it  into 
paint,  with  real  light  and  air  amid  the  branches ; 
but  rather  indeed  seeking  them.  For  the  most  part, 
as  the  National  Gallery  examples,  which  are  good 
and  typical,  tell,  he  chose  the  glade,  with  a  cottage 
here,  a  water-mill  there,  and  the  million  leaves  over 
all.  And  looking  at  these  pictures,  we  can  hear 
Hobbema  saying  of  the  murmuring  wood,  "  This  is 
my  Academy"  just  as  Crome  said  it  of  the  river 
bank,  as  he  and  his  pupils  were  sitting  one  day  at 
their  work  beside  the  Yare. 

The  National  Gallery  is  peculiarly  fortunate  in 
possessing,  beyond  the  reach  of  transatlantic  envy 
and  riches,  Hobbema's  strangely  fascinating  and 
very  different  picture,  "The  Avenue  at  Middel- 
harnis "  —  Middelharnis  being  one  of  the  towns 
which  claim  the  artist  as  a  son.  It  is  Hobbema's 
simplest  scene,  and  I  have  far  more  confidence  in 
saying  that  it  is  his  best  than  I  have  in  agreeing 
with  Mr.  Theobald  and  other  critics  in  their  sweep- 
ing appraisement  of  the  "Poringland  Oak"  as 
Crome's  best. 

80 


"The  Avenue  vt  Middelharnis" 

"The  Avenue  at  Middelharnis"  stands  alone. 
No  other  Hobbema  has  such  character.  I  wish  I 
had  a  screen  on  which  to  throw  a  photograph  of  it, 
to  bring  it  to  your  thoughts  more  vividly ;  for  it  is 
one  of  those  pictures  that  photography  cannot  much 
harm,  the  colour  of  it  being  subservient  to  feeling. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  is  also  one  of  the  most  easily 
remembered  pictures  in  the  world,  so  that  probably 
while  I  am  now  speaking  you  are  all  reconstructing  in 
your  minds  the  lopped  trees,  the  far-away  church 
with  its  bulbous  spire,  the  gardener  pruning  in  the 
right  foreground,  and  the  sportsman  with  his  dog  in 
the  middle  distance  —  these  last  being  perhaps  the 
work  of  a  figure  painter  called  in  for  the  purpose. 
But  it  is  not  they  that  matter.  What  matters  is  the 
landscape  and  the  truth  with  which  earth  and  sky 
have  been  painted  by  this  sincere  soul. 

The  partially  illegible  date  may  be  1669  and  it 
may  be  1689.  My  own  guess .  is  that  it  is  1669 ; 
but  whether  painted  then  or  many  years  later,  it  is 
Hobbema' s  last  dated  work,  for  a  reason  to  which 
we  shall  soon  come. 

These  pictures  are  on  one  end  wall  of  Room  IX  in 
the  National  Gallery.  The  opposite  wall  is  given 
chiefly  to  Ruysdael  and  one  of  the  side  walls  to 
Albert  Cuyp,  and  the  interesting  thing  is  that  it  is 
not  Hobbema  and  not  Ruysdael  but  Cuyp  who  stays 
in  our  mind  in  association  with  the  works  of  John 
Crome  when  we  move  on  to  Room  XXI,  where  they 
are  gathered.  Hobbema  was  his  dear  Hobbema, 
Q  8l 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

and  the  Poringland  oak,  as  I  have  said,  perhaps 
would  not  have  been  quite  the  tree  it  is  but  for 
Hobbema's  genius ;  yet  in  standing  before  the 
National  Gallery  Cromes  it  is  Cuyp  of  whom  we 
think  most. 

Mention  of  the  Middelharnis  gardener  and  sports- 
man reminds  me  that  Ruysdael  and  Hobbema  had 
yet  another  point  in  common  beyond  their  love  of 
Nature  and  their  love  of  Holland  and  their  truth 
and  patience.  They  both  employed  the  services  of 
the  same  figure  painters  when  it  chanced  that  the 
picture  needed  a  human  element  beyond  their  own 
capacity  to  render.  This  outside  assistance  was  of 
course  often  enough  called  in  by  artists  of  every 
period,  but  more  perhaps  by  the  Dutch  than  by  any ; 
for  it  was  peculiarly  in  the  Dutch  character  to 
specialize  —  Hobbema,  for  example,  in  foliage ;  and 
Ruysdael  in  great  prospects  and  waterfalls ;  and  the 
superb  and  joyous  Van  der  Heyden  in  street  facades. 
Hence  all  of  them,  now  and  then,  were  glad  of  help 
with  their  peasants  and  passers-by.  And  whether 
or  not  Hobbema  could  find  purchasers,  he  could 
always  find  the  highest  form  of  such  help ;  which, 
as  Bryan  points  out,  is  an  indication  that,  no  matter 
how  collectors  viewed  him,  he  was  held  in  high 
esteem  by  his  fellow-craftsmen. 

Both  he  and  Ruysdael  had  recourse  chiefly  to 
Nicholas  Berchem,  Wouwermans,  and  Adrian  van 
der  Velde. 

Berchem,  who  was  Ruysdael's  closest  friend  and 
82 


Three  Figure  Painters 

a  pupil  of  Van  Goyen,  is  famous  for  his  serene 
scenes  of  peasants  and  cattle :  such  goats  as 
frolic  in  fairyland  and  such  ruins  in  the  back- 
ground as  never  were  anywhere  but  in  his  happy 
mind. 

Philip  Wouwermans,  who  was  also  of  Haarlem,  is 
known  chiefly  by  his  battle  pictures,  always  with  a 
white  horse  in  them,  that  animal  being  as  clear  to 
him  as  a  spot  of  red  was  to  Corot.  If  we  may 
believe  the  ascriptions  of  his  works  scattered  all 
over  Europe,  this  country,  and  doubtless  America 
too,  Wouwermans  painted  more  industriously  than 
almost  anyone  in  a  profession  notorious  for  produc- 
tivity. 

The  third  assistant,  Adrian  van  der  Velde,  a 
pupil  of  Wouwermans,  was  a  very  charming  painter 
of  landscape  and  rural  scenes,  but  a  large  part  of  his 
time  was  given  to  figure  painting  for  others.  In 
particular  he  is  said  to  have  humanized  the  urban 
paradises  of  Van  der  Hey  den. 

Of  all  these  men,  who  did  for  Hobbema,  on 
occasion,  what  Michael  Sharp  and  William  Shayer 
did  for  Crome,  examples  are  to  be  seen  in  our 
National  Gallery  and  at  Hertford  House,  and  if 
these  words  of  mine  have  the  effect  of  sending  any 
of  you  to  those  collections  on  your  next  visit  to 
London ,  I  shall  be  well  repaid ;  for  it  is  the  chief 
ambition  of  the  lover  of  pictures,  and  sometimes  his 
reward,  to  make  two  persons  enter  the  National 
Gallery  where  only  one  entered  before. 

83 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

A  word  as  to  Crome's  allies  in  making  his  pictures 
more  human  or  animated.  Michael  Sharp  was  a 
painter  of  portraits  and  figure  subjects  who,  like 
Crome,  but  more  regularly  so,  was  a  pupil  of 
Beechey.  It  was  he  who  put  in  the  bathers  in  the 
"Poringland  Oak,"  three  of  the  boys  being  young 
Cromes,  and  the  other  the  son  of  a  Norwich  mail- 
cart  driver  name  Aldous.  One  of  the  Crome  boys 
in  the  picture  —  the  little  fat  naked  one,  I  believe 
—  was  named  after  Sharp  himself,  Michael  Sharp 
Crome,  and  he  afterwards  became  a  successful 
dancing-master  in  this  town.  Sharp  died  at 
Boulogne  in  1840. 

Crome  had  recourse  now  and  then  also  to 
William  Shayer,  a  young  cattle  painter,  who  intro- 
duced the  cows  in  the  picture  of  Chapel  Fields  in  the 
National  Gallery.  Of  Shayer  I  know  nothing  save 
that  Crome  named  no  dancing-master  after  him  and 
he  lived  to  a  very  great  age,  dying  in  1879.  The 
cattle  in  the  great  "Mousehold  Heath"  picture 
had  nothing  to  do  with  Crome  at  all,  but  were  added 
after  his  death  by  an  unknown  hand. 

Returning  now  to  Hobbema  once  more,  we  come 
upon  disaster.  Hobbema  married  in  1668.  He  was 
then  thirty  and  his  wife  thirty-four;  and  his  best 
man  was  his  friend  Ruysdael,  who  through  life  re- 
mained a  bachelor.  Note  the  year  of  the  marriage 
— 1668  —  and  remember  what  was  said  just  now 
about  the  date  of  "The  Avenue  at  Middelharnis." 
The  tragedy  is  that  whether  that  picture's  date  is 
84 


Excisemen  of  Genius 

1669  or  1689,  it  was  Hobbema's  only  work  of  art 
after  his  marriage. 

Whatever  of  happiness  Hobbema's  union  with 
Mrs.  Hobbema  may  have  brought  him,  it  was  the 
end  for  us ;  for  his  wife,  who  had  been  a  domestic 
servant  in  the  family  of  the  Burgomaster  of 
Amsterdam,  chancing  to  be  acquainted  with  a 
woman  of  influence,  used  that  acquaintanceship  so 
adroitly  that  her  husband  was  appointed  at  once  to 
a  post  under  the  wine  customs.  This  brought  in 
enough  to  live  upon,  and  was  no  doubt  a  more 
dependable  business  than  that  of  painting  sunlight 
through  trees,  however  wonderfully.  In  times  of 
stress  landscapes  are  the  first  things  we  cut  off; 
whatever  happens,  whether  of  good  or  ill,  men  must 
have  wine. 

How  many  geniuses  have  been  connected  with  the 
excise  I  have  not  inquired ;  but  it  is  interesting  to 
find  the  rural  painter  Hobbema  and  the  peasant 
poet  Burns  together  in  that  galley.  Hobbema, 
however,  differed  from  Robbie  in  having  to  pay 
for  his  position.  The  influential  friend  of  his  wife 
was  rewarded  by  an  annual  grant  from  the  artist  of 
250  florins,  to  be  paid  until  she,  through  marriage, 
could  afford  to  do  without  it.  The  deed  still  exists. 

I  said  a  little  while  back  that  the  name  of 
Thomas  Harvey  of  Catton,  the  intermediary  between 
Hobbema  and  Crome,  should  be  engraved  on  a 
cornice  of  the  House  of  Art.  What  then  should 
be  done  with  Mrs.  Hobbema  ?  Let  us  hope  that 

85 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

she  brought  her  husband  many  compensations  for 
the  divine  fire  which  she  had  taken  from  him. 
Whatever  excellence  he  may  have  attained  as  an 
exciseman,  we  can  only  exclaim,  in  Mr.  Dobson's 
phrase  in  one  of  his  fables,  "But  O  the  artist  that 
was  lost!"  And  yet  if  "The  Avenue  at  Middel- 
harnis"  —  his  best  picture,  as  I  believe  —  is  the  only 
one  painted  after  Mrs.  Hobbema  began  her  reign, 
as  is  stated  in  the  memoirs,  then  perhaps  after  all 
she  should  have  her  golden  letters  too,  for  it  may 
be  that  the  difference  in  quality  —  the  beautiful 
melancholy  of  it  —  is  due  in  some  subtle  way  to 
her  alienation  of  her  husband  from  his  chosen  path ; 
and  thus  everything  came  out  right.  A  wise 
fatalism  would  lead  us  to  that  conclusion ;  for  only 
by  the  steps  of  the  journey,  whether  joyously 
springy  or  painful,  can  the  goal  be  reached. 

Since  Hobbema  was  only  thirty  when  he  married, 
it  is  to  his  wife's  commercial  instinct  that  must 
be  attributed  the  chief  cause  of  the  scarcity  of 
his  pictures.  Compared  with  that  of  most  of  the 
greatest  Dutch  painters  —  always  excepting  such 
notably  rare  masters  as,  for  example,  Vermer  of 
Delft,  Fabritius,  and  Seghers  —  Hobbema's  output 
was  small,  and  until  recently  nine-tenths  of  his 
paintings  were  in  England.  To-day  I  fear  that  this 
proportion  has  decreased,  for  there  is  a  work  of  art 
which  latterly  has  become  more  precious  to  the 
English  collector  than  any  study  of  Dutch  oaks  or 
water-mills,  and  that  is  an  American  cheque. 
86 


Prudent  Dealers 

But  there  are  two  other  reasons  for  Hobbema's 
rarity.  One  is  that  he  was  probably  minutely 
laborious  in  his  methods  (although  that,  it  is  true, 
applies  to  many  of  his  more  fruitful  contemporaries), 
and  therefore  painted  slowly  and  not  overmuch ; 
the  other,  that  he  was  never  in  any  demand,  nor 
did  he  become  popular  till  comparatively  recently, 
so  that  not  only  were  his  living  faculties  discouraged, 
but  those  posthumous  activities  so  urgent  in  the 
case  of  more  desired  artists  have  had  little  play. 
Corot,  for  example,  has  painted  far  more  since 
his  death  than  ever  he  did  before  it. 

So  little  indeed  was  Hobbema  in  demand,  that 
for  a  considerable  time  all  prudent  dealers  who 
chanced  to  have  any  of  his  works  on  their  hands 
were  careful  to  put  Jacob  Ruysdael's  signature  to 
them,  knowing  that  only  thus  was  a  purchaser  likely 
to  be  found.  The  action  was  no  doubt  immoral  — 
according,  at  any  rate,  to  the  standards  of  those  of 
us  who  are  not  picture  dealers  —  but  I  think  that  it 
had  some  justification  in  the  extraordinary  pleasure 
it  would  have  given  to  Hobbema,  could  he  have 
glimpsed  the  rascals  at  it  through  the  loopholes  of 
heaven.  For  I  am  sure  his  feeling  for  Ruysdael 
was  so  near  idolatry  that  he  was  capable  of  being 
flattered  by  the  false  ascription. 

Little  other  information  concerning  Hobbema  can 
be  gathered,  save  the  fact  that  he  had  one  son  and 
two  daughters,  of  whom,  however,  nothing  is  known ; 
and  that  he  fell  upon  poverty.  Van  Goyen  had  died 

87 


Old  Crome's  Hobbema 

in  1666;  Salomon  Ruysdael  in  1670.  la  1681 
Jacob  Ruysdael,  being  taken  ill,  left  Amsterdam  for 
Haarlem,  where  he  died  in  1682.  Hobbema  lived 
on,  in  a  house  just  outside  Amsterdam,  on  the  south 
side  of  the  Rosengracht,  opposite  that  one  from 
which,  in  1669,  Rembrandt's  body  had  been  carried 
to  the  grave. 

All  we  know  for  certain  of  these  later  years  is 
that  both  Hobbema  and  his  wife  had  pauper  funerals. 
His  own  was  on  December  14th,  1709. 

Two  centuries  later  one  of  his  pictures  fetched 
eight  thousand  guineas  at  Christie's. 


Persons  of  Quality        ^v        <^y        <o        ^> 
I.  —  MR.  FRANK,  OF  BOLOGNA 

BOLOGNA'S  greatest  pride  is,  I  suppose,  Guido 
Reni ;  but  he  would  not  be  my  choice.  Nor 
would  Giulio  Romano,  or  the  mild  Francia,  or 
Giovanni  of  Bologna,  who  made  the  Neptune 
fountain,  and  whom  Landor  told  Emerson  he  pre- 
ferred to  Michael  Angelo ;  although  he  did  not,  I 
think,  quite  mean  it.  (We  say  odd  things  to 
Amercians,  just  for  fun,  sometimes.)  I  should  name 
Mr.  Frank,  for  many  reasons,  such  as  (a)  Mr.  Frank 
is  alive,  and  (6)  Mr.  Frank  befriends  the  friendless 
and  houses  the  homeless,  and  (c)  Mr.  Frank  is  an 
arboriculturist,  and  (d)  Mr.  Frank  loves  the  English 
soil  and  most  of  the  things  that  it  produces. 

Mr.  Frank  is  seventy :  spare,  alert,  vigorous. 
His  nationality  is  probably  German  Swiss;  he  is 
one  of  those  strange  people  whose  peculiar  destiny 
it  is  to  set  roofs  over  English  and  American 
travellers ;  provide  meals  to  nourish  them  and  beds 
to  rest  them;  and  (the  next  day)  to  place  before 


Persons  of  Quality 

them  reminders  that  this,  after  all,  is  not  Arcadia. 
Vfr.  Frank,  being  true  to  his  blood,  keeps  an  hotel, 
but  it  is  unique  among  hotels  in  being  a  converted 
palazzo  of  the  fifteenth  century :  spacious,  splendid, 
quiet,  and  efficient  —  the  H6tel  Brun,  in  fact. 

But  let  no  one  think  that  in  calling  Mr.  Frank 
an  innkeeper  he  has  been  summed  up.  For  he  is 
more.  Now  and  again,  as  one  ranges  this  little 
planet,  one  meets  with  an  innkeeper  who  is  also  a 
man,  a  brother,  and  even  something  beyond.  There 
is  one  at  Brighton,  and  Mr.  Frank  is  another.  Just 
as  the  city  of  Bologna  differs  from  all  other  cities  in 
being  built  upon  colonnades  of  arches,  so  that  you 
may  walk  almost  uninterruptedly  under  cover  for 
miles,  and  just  as  the  Hotel  Brun  differs  from  all 
other  hotels  in  its  origin  and  aristocratic  bland  self- 
possession,  so  does  Mr.  Frank  differ  from  all  other 
hotel  proprietors  in  possessing  a  hillside  villa,  sur- 
rounded by  vineyards,  whither  it  is  his  delight  to 
lead  chosen  guests,  and  also  in  having  written  a 
slender  Guide  to  his  adopted  city,  where  he  has  been, 
since  1868,  with  naturally  a  reference  or  so  to  the 
Hotel  Brun  in  it,  but  no  paltry  mercenary  emphasis 
at  all :  just  these  two  modest  sentences  at  the 
close—  "Very  often  visitors  say  that,  if  they  knew 
how  interesting  Bologna  was,  they  would  have 
arranged  for  a  longer  stay.  May  this  little  Guide 
tend  to  make  Bologna  better  known!" 

Mr.  Frank  not  only  keeps  the  Brun,  but  is  a 
famous  vintner,  and  exports  wine  to  Englajid,  and  it 
90 


The  Figs 

was  in  the  wine  season  that  I  met  him.  "Would 
you  like,"  he  said,  falling  with  his  English  and  his 
friendliness  out  of  a  clear  sky  into  an  alien  world  of 
waiters,  "to  see  them  picking  grapes  on  the  hill? 
It  is  only  a  few  minutes  distant."  Of  course ;  and 
off  we  started  at  nine  in  the  morning  along  the 
Piazza  Malpighi,  past  S.  Francesco,  with  the  green 
tombs  of  the  Glossatori  on  pillars  outside  it,  into 
the  Via  Sant'  Isaia  to  the  boulevard,  and  then  up  a 
steep  and  narrow  road,  past  one  villa  after  another, 
until  we  turned  in  at  the  hospitable  gate.  The  sun 
was  already  powerful,  lizards  were  darting  like 
shadows  over  the  walls,  and  Bologna's  red  roofs 
below  were  beginning  to  smoulder. 

Mr.  Frank  had  been  topographer  and  historian  on 
the  way  up ;  once  inside  his  grounds  he  became  a 
botanist  and  an  arboriculturist.  He  led  us  from 
flower  to  flower,  from  tree  to  tree,  including,  I  am 
happy  to  say,  the  best  of  all,  the  ficus  aurea  (to 
adopt  his  own  learned  tongue  at  this  stage),  into 
which  he  sent  an  ancient  blue-linened  gardener, 
with  a  neck  of  that  crocodile-skin  consistency  and 
pattern  which  the  Italian  peasants  so  often  possess, 
to  pick  a  basket  of  "honey  drops,"  as  these  little 
yellow  figs  are  called,  and  these  he  divided  into  four 
with  great  dexterity  and  neatness  with  his  knife, 
one  after  the  other,  until  we  had  learned  to  do  it 
ourselves.  And  so  we  passed  through  the  vineyards, 
where  the  peasants  were  piling  purple  grapes  and 
green  into  barrels,  some  day  to  warm  the  heart  as 


Persons  of  Quality 

Sangiovese  and  Cabernet,  Trebbiano  and  Sauvignon, 
to  the  villa  itself,  which  was  as  comfortable  as  any 
house  could  be  asked  to  be,  and  had  the  added 
attraction  of  two  round-eyed  grandchildren  in  the 
midst  of  dolls  and  Teddy  bears. 

Beside  it  were  dark  walks  of  clipped  box,  fragrant 
with  that  box-leaf  scent,  the  same  everywhere, 
which  carries  the  mind  so  quickly  to  other  haunts 
and  reminds  me  always  of  the  chalet  above  Burford 
Bridge,  and  here  and  there  a  statue  or  terminal 
figure,  and  everywhere  a  sentinel  cypress  looking 
on,  and  at  one  place  the  opening  to  a  subterranean 
passage  a  hundred  yards  long ;  and  above  the  villa, 
always  climbing,  greater  trees,  such  as  the  Scotch 
fir;  and  more  vineyards,  where  we  ate  grapes  of  all 
denominations,  and  found  the  muscatel  the  most 
alluring ;  and  a  cattle-shed  containing  two  of  the 
great,  white,  placid  cows  of  Lombardy ;  and  so  to  a 
chestnut  grove  where  classical  poetry  must  surely 
have  been  written,  with  purple  colchicums  and 
cyclamen  in  the  grass.  And  all  the  while  Mr. 
Frank  had  never  ceased  to  touch  lovingly  this  trunk 
and  that,  recalling  the  year  in  which  he  had  planted 
them,  or  some  other  association ;  describing  the  joy 
of  the  spring  on  this  hillside,  its  birds  and  song ; 
or  asking  for  particulars  concerning  the  growth  of 
certain  flowers  in  England.  All  collectors  who  love 
their  possessions  tenderly  are  good  company;  but 
a  collector  of  trees  and  flowers  in  a  foreign  country 
is  peculiarly  interesting,  especially  when  he  has  for 
92 


George  Morrow 

their   well-being   so   watchful   an   eye   and   instant   a 
hand. 

Mr.  Frank  says  at  the  beginning  of  his  little  Guide 
that  the  visitor  to  Bologna  will  find  "its  thrifty 
citizens  courteous  and  obliging,  and  will  go  away 
impressed  with  the  vigour  of  the  men  of  Bologna 
and  the  comely  dignity  of  her  women,  even  those 
of  the  lower  classes."  That  is  true.  And  if  the 
visitor  has  luck,  he  can  go  away  impressed  also  with 
the  gentle  charm  and  profound  love  of  Nature  of  an 
innkeeper  in  ten  thousand. 


II.  —  GEORGE  MORROW  * 

It  is  George  Morrow's  special  gift  to  pencil  his 
comments  on  the  margin  of  life.  The  soul  of 
modesty,  his  route  is  essentially  the  by-way.  The 
high  road  is  for  others :  for  Mr.  Partridge  and  Mr. 
Raven  Hill,  both  concerned  with  politics,  English  and 
foreign,  international  complications,  and  the  other 
grave  matters  upon  which  we  look  to  Punch  for  a 
weekly  criticism ;  for  Mr.  Townsend  and  Mr.  Gunning 
King,  who  delineate  the  straightforward  humours  of 
domestic  experience.  Mr.  Morrow's  game  is  humbler 

'The  illustrations  to  this  essay  —  and  I  wish  there  were 
twice  as  many  —  are  reproduced  by  the  kind  permission  of 
the  proprietors  of  Punch. 

93 


Persons  of  Quality 

and  more  idiosyncratic  —  the  record  of  his  own  quaint 
ruminations.  Whatever  happens,  he  has  his  thoughts, 
and  no  one  else  has  thoughts  at  all  resembling  them. 
He  is  probably  the  most  consistently  original  comic 
draughtsman  now  working.  Caran  d'Ache  was 
technically  more  brilliant  and  more  carelessly  witty ; 


THE  LITTLE  WORRIES  OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES 

A  knight  overhauling  his  stock  of  doubtful  coins  prior  to  a 
distribution  of  largesse 


and  Caran  d'Ache  was  as  certainly  George  Morrow's 
predecessor  as  Wilhelm  Busch  was  Caran  d'Ache's. 
But  no  one  who  knows  Morrow's  work  would  for  a 
moment  suggest  that  he  is  derivative,  except  now 
and  then  in  external  form.  His  orginality  is  incor- 
ruptible :  I  never  met  anyone  who  more  detested 
imitation  and  "conveyance."  Even  if  a  suggestion 
94 


A  Comic  Individualist 

is  given  to  him,  the  treatment  is  his  own :  that  is  to 
say,  the  idea  is  enriched  by  the  play  of  the  artist's 
personality.  But  only  one  or  two  per  cent,  of  his 
drawings  owe,  I  believe,  anything  to  outside  hints : 
the  rest  are  the  result  of  their  creator's  sidelong 
humour  unaided.  Caran  d'Ache  not  only  made  the 
pictorial  sequence  peculiarly  his  own,  but  founded 


TOURISTS  LISTENING  TO  THE  SOUND  OF  MULL 

upon  history  some  very  pleasant  jeux  d'esprit;  yet 
between  him  and  Mr.  Morrow  there  is  no  real 
similarity.  The  witty,  dashing  bravado  of  the 
Frenchman  is  one  thing,  and  the  quaint,  ruminative 
subtleties  of  our  Irishman  are  another;  while  both 
contribute  radiance  to  the  slender  band  of  great 
comic  outlinists. 

George   Morrow  has   this   quality  in  common  with 
Caran    d'Ache :      he    scamps    nothing    and    forgets 

95 


Persons  of  Quality 

nothing.  Every  part  of  the  picture,  however 
crowded  it  may  be,  has  had  consideration.  It  is 
this  minute  thoughtfulness  which  makes  his  work  so 
rich,  for  one  is  continually  coming  upon  new  details 
of  fun  or  mischief,  overlooked  before.  The  com- 


JULIUS  CAESAR  INTERVIEWING  BARBARIAN  CAPTIVES  ON 

THE  SUBJECT  OF  THE  CURE  AND  PREVENTION 

OF  BALDNESS 

monest  charge  that  is  brought  against  many  of  our 
comic  draughtsmen  is  that  their  drawings  are  "so 
soon  over."  It  could  never  be  urged  against  George 
Morrow,  whose  backgrounds  work  for  their  living 
too.  This  stealthily  accumulative  sense  of  the 
ridiculous  is  very  rare. 

96 


An  Old  Joke  Made  New 

I  have  said  that  Mr.  Morrow  does  not  illustrate 
what  are  called  "social  subjects."  Not  that  he  is 
insensitive  to  the  humours  of  normal  everyday  life 
(far  from  it !) ;  but  their  translation  into  black  and 
white  is  not  his  first  metier.  The  fanciful  and 
grotesque  are  nearer  his  heart.  Nevertheless,  I  have 
always  thought  the  legend  beneath  his  Punch  draw- 
ing of  the  poor  woman  and  the  wag  one  of  the 
classic  contributions  to  that  paper.  The  words,  I 
may  remark,  are  the  artist's  own.  The  wife  of  the 
unemployed  says,  "My  'usband  finds  it  very  'ard  — 
very  'ard  indeed,  sir  —  to  get  any  work  at  his  trade." 
"I  suppose,"  replies  the  facetious  gentleman  (getting 
off  an  old  joke),  "I  suppose  he's  a  snow  shoveller." 
"Indeed  no,"  says  the  woman.  "No  such  luck,  sir. 
'E's  only  a  snow  shoveller's  labourer." 

One  of  Mr.  Morrow's  art  editors  once  said  —  not  in 
any  spirit  of  complaint,  but  merely  as  a  curious  fact 
—  that  all  the  people  in  his  drawings  are  idiots. 
The  criticism  may  go  too  far,  but  it  is  illuminative 
too,  for  it  suggests  the  world  of  .busy  simpletons  in 
which  this  artist's  pencil  has  its  being.  He  has 
created  a  universe  of  fussy  foolishness  and  petty 
importance.  He  is  the  Mantegna  of  Gotham. 

But  even  more  do  I  value  his  work  as  a  historian. 
It  would  seem  to  be  the  peculiar  province  of  Irish 
humorists  to  show  us  the  unfamiliar  side.  Oscar 
Wilde  did  it  again  and  again :  a  trick  of  inverting 
truth  was  signally  his.  Mr.  Shaw  is  continually 
startling  us  by  the  persuasiveness  with  which  he  pre- 

H  97 


Persons  of  Quality 

sents  the  case  of  the  minority.  Mr.  Morrow  illumines 
the  unexpected  too,  and  not  only  the  unexpected 
but  that  variety  of  the  unexpected  which  we  our- 
selves had  never  thought  about.  As  one  example 
take  his  drawing  of  the  mediaeval  lord  who  is  about 
to  distribute  largesse  to  the  crowd.  No  one  else 


TOUCHING  FILIAL  PIETY  OF  ROMULUS  AS  SHOWN  IN  HIS 
TREATMENT  OF  HIS  FOSTER-MOTHER 


commissioned  to  execute  this  scene  would  have 
remembered  that  mediaeval  lords  probably  performed 
such  duties  very  reluctantly,  and  first,  assisted  by 
their  prudent  ladies,  went  through  their  coffers  for 
coins  of  doubtful  integrity  —  to  get  rid  of  those  first. 
Yet  how  natural  —  when  you  do  think  of  it ! 
98 


Comic  Historians 

In  looking  at  these  historical  and  biographical 
episodes,  the  curious  thing  that  strikes  one  is  that 
so  much  had  been  left  for  Mr.  Morrow  to  think  of. 
Consider,  for  example,  how  many  funny  men  have 
been  at  work  on  the  humours  of  history  —  from 
Gilbert  a  Beckett  and  his  illustrator  down  to  the 
entertaining  hand  that  depicted  the  Cork  Lino 
drolleries  of  a  few  years  ago.  And  remembering 
the  many  obvious  jokes,  look  again  at  Mr.  Morrow's 
drawing  of  a  little  supper  party  at  the  Borgias'.  It 
is  astonishing  that  this  was  waiting  for  him ;  and 
yet  not  astonishing  at  all.  Here  one  sees  at  once  a 
new  and  subtler  treatment :  the  external  humour 
has  been  supplemented  by  a  rush  of  absurdity,  and 
psychology  has  been  added.  For  Mr.  Morrow  is 
always  a  psychologist :  he  is  always  interested,  not 
only  in  the  joke,  but  in  its  dramatis  personse.  There 
is  a  double  impact :  on  you,  the  reader,  and  on 
them,  the  participants. 

Take,  again,  the  picture  of  Romulus  and  Remus. 
One  would  have  thought  that  every  joke  possible 
about  those  brothers  had  been  made  fifty  years  ago. 
But  it  was  left  for  George  Morrow  to  depict  one 
more  perfectly  natural  yet  perfectly  absurd  episode 
in  their  career :  the  two  brothers  piously  taking 
their  foster-mother  for  a  ride  in  a  Bath  chair.  In 
the  same  manner  is  his  scene  from  the  life  of  Julius 
Caesar.  Given  the  subject,  to  find  a  novel  humorous 
treatment  of  Julius  Csesar,  how  many  comic  draughts- 
men in  the  history  of  black-and-white  would  have 

99 


Persons  of  Quality 

hit  on  anything  so  amusing  or  quaint  as  George 
Morrow's  picture  of  the  bald  Emperor  interviewing 
three  hairy  barbarian  captives  as  to  how  they 
managed  to  get  such  a  growth  !  And  having  suffi- 
ciently enjoyed  this  scene,  who  would  believe  that  a 
further  and  equally  diverting  variation  on  the  theme 
of  Caesar's  baldness  was  still  possible  ?  Yet  after  an 


A  LITTLE  SUPPER  AT  THE  BORGIAS' 

interval  of  a  few  years  we  had  from  the  same  pencil 
the  picture  of  the  loyal  but  misguided  Roman  who  had 
presented  his  Emperor  with  his  bust  tactlessly  con- 
structed from  an  ostrich  egg.  In  the  misgivings  of 
the  artist,  suddenly  beginning  to  be  aware  of  his 
blunder  (yet  the  artist  all  the  time),  and  the  conflict 
in  the  Emperor's  mind  as  he  analyses  for  motives  to 
decide  between  deliberate  insult  or  thoughtless  zeal, 
100 


The  Pea-Farm 

the  full  flavour  of  Morrow's  curious  humour  may  be 
found.  For  it  is  his  special  gift  to  invent  asses  and 
then  be  rather  sorry  for  them.  But  they  must  be 
exploited  first. 

The  peculiar  charm  of  these  drawings  is  that  not 


GROWING  PEAS  FOR  POLICE- WHISTLES  AT  THE 
WORMWOOD  SCRUBS  PEA-FARM 


only  are  they  exceedingly  funny,  both  in  the  gross 
and  in  detail,  every  expression  being  separately 
imagined  by  the  artist,  but  they  are  also  within  the 
bounds  of  possibility,  if  not  probability.  It  is  normal 
humour  all  the  time.  Such  a  simple,  although 
superficially  comic,  device  as  inverted  chronology  our 
artist  disdains :  he  would  never,  for  example,  put 

101 


Persons  of  Quality 

an  ancient  into  a  motor-car,  or  bring  William  the 
Conqueror  to  England  in  a  steamer,  which  was,  I 
remember,  one  of  the  great  jokes  of  the  comic 
historian  O.  P.  Q.  Philander  Smith.  His  method  is 
subtler  and  truer,  as,  for  example,  when  he  shows 
his  centaur  harnessed  to  a  chariot  to  represent  an 
early  cab,  and  the  centaur  (described  as  the 
"primeval  extortionist")  looking  at  a  coin  in  his 
hand  which  his  fare  has  just  given  him,  and  asking, 
'"Ere,  wot's  this?"  That  had  to  be  thought  of  by 
some  one,  but  George  Morrow  alone  could  think  of 
it.  The  drawing  might  stand  as  a  symbol  of  his 
reconciling  humour,  which  fuses  the  past  and  the 
present,  proves  that  we  were  always  as  absurd  as 
now,  and  bridges  the  ages  with  laughter. 


III.  —  WISH  WYNNE  l 

Wish  Wynne  is  a  new  music-hall  singer;  and  not 
only  a  new  singer,  but  a  new  variety  of  singer.  She 
is  quiet,  humane,  understanding ;  she  is  out  to 

'Since  this  essay  in  appreciation  was  written,  in  1912,  the 
lady  has  gone  on  the  stage  proper,  and,  as  I  correct  these  proofs, 
is  delighting  audiences  in  Mr.  Bennett's  "  Great  Adventure." 
But  I  want  to  see  her  in  the  halls  again.  Those  she  lifts. 
And  since  she  herself  writes  all  the  words  of  her  songs  and 
sketches,  and  another  could  —  although,  I  admit,  not  half  so 
well  —  speak  Mr.  Bennett's  lines,  the  loss  is  great. 

102 


Wish  Wynne 

destroy  nothing ;  she  can  do  without  laughter ;  she 
can  do  without  an  orchestra  or  limelight,  if  need  be. 
She  has  truth  and  restraint  on  her  side,  and  some- 
thing more :  she  has  sympathy,  and  insists  on  adding 
yours  to  it.  She  is  without  vanity,  and  in  her  own 
person,  when  not  singing  a  character-song,  might 
even  disappoint,  for  her  assurance  is  by  no  means 
perfect  until  she  believes  herself  to  be  some  one 
else.  Her  voice  also  is  hardly  up  to  a  song  pure  and 
simple,  being  better  suited  for  a  semi-recitative ;  it 
has  a  faint  American  echo,  although  she  seems  to  be 
English  otherwise. 

But  such  defects  matter  nothing.  Many  a  fine 
artist  has  had  to  forget  self  and  impersonate 
another  before  acquiring  power,  and  Wish  Wynne 
is  among  them.  Directly  she  assumes  the  guise  of 
a  downtrodden  London  girl  everything  changes. 
No  more  indecisions ;  the  character  is  as  clear  and 
firm  as  an  etching.  These  are  her  special  forte : 
little  London  girls,  with  a  knowledge  of  life  and  a 
capacity  for  enjoyment,  whose  destiny  it  is  to  be 
misunderstood  and  put  upon.  It  is  a  common  type, 
and  Wish  Wynne  makes  it  extraordinarily  real. 
You  remember  her  half-tones  after  all  the  stridencies 
of  the  evening  are  happily  lost. 

Listening  to  Wish  Wynne  (what  a  clever  name  !), 
you  realize  that  at  last  the  halls  have  an  artist 
again.  She  is  not  like  anyone  else,  nor  has  she  had 
a  predecessor.  Into  this  atmosphere  of  coarseness 
and  furtive  laughter  she  brings  a  clean  humour,  with 

103 


Persons  of  Quality 

a  leaven  of  pathos  all  her  own.  There  have  been 
slaveys  on  the  music-hall  stage  time  and  again. 
Jenny  Hill  loved  the  type,  and  made  it  voluble  and 
caustic;  her  daughter,  Peggy  Pryde,  recaptured 
some  of  her  vitality ;  while  there  was  the  astonish- 
ing Ada  Lundberg,  some  twenty  years  ago,  with  a 
blacking-brush  in  one  hand  and  a  boot  in  the  other, 
telling  of  the  calamities  that  follow  upon  walking 
with  a  soldier.  But  these  saw  only  the  comic  or 
sordid  side  of  the  slavey's  life  —  or,  to  be  more  exact, 
comic  and  sordid,  the  blend  that  best  produces 
music-hall  laughter  to-day :  the  side,  in  short,  that 
the  audience  expected.  Wish  Wynne  is  different. 
She  gives  the  audience  not  what  they  expect,  and 
not,  perhaps,  wholly  what  they  want,  judging  by  the 
laughter  that  early  in  her  songs  one  hears  before  a 
sentence  is  finished,  prompted  by  the  hope  that  it  is 
to  take  a  different  and  more  conventional  turn ;  yet 
once  the  silly  creatures  understand  that  here  is  a 
performer  whose  every  word  is  of  value  and  none 
has  two  meanings  their  attention  is  complete.  No 
comic  singer  gets  such  rapt  audiences. 

In  one  of  her  songs  she  is  the  little  slavey  who 
believes  that  all  her  mistresses  are  against  her.  She 
passes  them  in  review,  and  dismisses  them  as  hope- 
less, one  after  the  other,  in  a  chorus  beginning, 
''But  'er !  Oh,  'er  !"  This  is  exact:  there  is  not  a 
false  touch ;  and  though  it  is  frankly  humorous,  the 
singer  gives  it  just  that  little  addition  of  character  — 
wistfulness  and  the  comic  critical  spirit  of  the 
104 


A  Surprise  for  the  Halls 

Londoner  mixed  —  which  lifts  it  to  a  creation. 
Many  singers  could  make  an  audience  laugh  with 
the  same_  words ;  Wish  Wynne  alone  could  touch 
them  too.  In  another  song  she  is  a  child  of  a  mean 
street,  always  in  hot  water  with  her  mother  and 
father,  the  victim  of  iron  circumstance.  But  she  has 
a  consolation  —  the  reflection,  "No  matter,  they'll  be 
sorry  when  I'm  dead."  Another  song  shows  a  very 
similar  type  whose  particular  cross  is  a  playmate,  Elsie 
Evelyn  Martin.  Elsie  is  spiteful  and  treacherous. 
Wish  has  "pinched"  an  apple;  Elsie  Evelyn  begs 
her  to  "pinch"  another  for  her,  and,  being  refused, 
tells  Wish's  mother  of  the  theft.  The  result  is  that 
the  girl  who  is  singing  her  woes  has  been  forbidden 
to  go  to  the  Bible  class :  a  peculiarly  hard  misfortune, 
since  not  only  has  she  got  by  heart  her  hymn,  her 
chapter  of  St.  John,  and  her  prayer,  but  close  to  the 
church  is  a  lovely  shop  "where  you  can  pinch  'em 
fine."  Now,  here  is  totally  new  ground  being  broken 
in  music-halls.  Before  Wish  a  slum  schoolgirl  on  the 
boards  had  sung  only  about  what  she  saw  through 
the  keyhole  when  her  big  sister  and  her  young  man 
were  together,  and  so  forth.  Nothing  else  was  asked 
of  her.  Wish  Wynne  repulses  such  seaminess  and 
gives  us  instead  a  little  comedy  of  the  soul. 

One  other  departure  has  she  made.  She  sings,  as 
a  country  girl,  a  song  about  her  young  man.  Now 
one  knows  what  to  expect  when  the  "comedienne" 
or  "soubrette"  or  "serio"  offers  this  theme: 
probably  the  young  man  is  a  swindler  and  makes 

105 


Persons  of  Quality 

off  with  her  savings ;  almost  certainly  he  is  faithless. 
But  Wish  Wynne's  lover  is  very  plain  (although  she 
has  "seen  lads  as  ugly  as  he"),  and  she  is  in  some 
doubt  as  to  whether  she  really  loves  him  enough, 
and  her  father  and  mother  and  friends  are  all  against 
the  marriage.  She  recognizes  their  practical  wisdom, 
and  yet  —  "I  dunno."  Each  verse  ends  in  this  shy, 
affectionate  dubiety.  She  even  has  decided  to  give 
him  up,  and  then  she  looks  at  his  faithful  red  hair 
and  freckles  and  thinks  of  how  kind  he  has  been  to 
her;  and  —  "Well,  I  dunno."  Now,  here  is  more 
new  ground ;  and  though  one  does  not  want  the 
halls  to  be  visited  by  an  inundation  of  sentimentality 
(as  in  this  imitative  profession  is  only  too  likely), 
yet  when  it  is  provided  by  such  a  true  artist  as 
this  unobtrusive  new  singer  we  can  be  very  glad  to 
meet  with  it. 


IV.  —  MASTERS,  NEW  AND  OLD 

The  most  remarkable  thing  about  championship 
billiards  —  after  the  wizardry  of  it  —  is  the  gulf  that 
divides  the  handful  of  best  men  from  the  handful  of 
next  best  men,  and  the  gulf  that  divides  that  second 
handful  from  every  one  else.  In  all  other  games  you 
can  count  the  absolutely  first-class  men  by  scores. 
I  do  not  mean  that  there  is  not  one  a  shade  better 
1 06 


Kings  of  Ivory 

than  the  others,  because  there  is :  otherwise  there 
would  be  no  champion ;  but  the  throne  is  surrounded 
by  claimants  entitled  to  stand  on  the  top  step  of  the 
dai's.  W.  G.  Grace,  for  example,  was  for  a  long  time 
beyond  all  question  the  best  cricketer;  but  other 
men  occasionally  had  better  seasons,  and  quite 
inferior  players  could  bowl  him  out  and  defy  his 
bowling.  Mr.  John  Ball  junior  was  the  amateur 
golf  champion,  yet  England  and  Scotland  are 
sprinkled  with  men  who  can  give  him  a  stiff  game, 
and  he  has  been  beaten,  I  suppose,  on  many  links. 

But  in  billiards  it  is  a  case  of  the  best  first  and 
the  rest  almost  nowhere ;  and  at  the  present  moment, 
among  the  continually  active  players,  the  best  are 
only  five  in  number :  Stevenson,  Inman,  Reece, 
Diggle,  and  Aiken.  I  omit  John  Roberts,  because 
not  only  is  he  old  and  ill  but  for  years  he  has  stood 
apart  in  aristocratic  aloofness ;  I  omit  Peall  and 
Dawson  because  they  have  retired,  and  Gray  because 
he  is  a  specialist. 

Then  comes  the  first  gulf,  on  the  hither  (or  our) 
side  of  which  are  Harverson  and  Smith  and  Cook 
and  Newman  and  young  Peall,  for  example. 

And  then  comes  the  second  gulf,  and  after  that 
we  need  not  trouble  very  much,  for  there  is  no  magic 
left  —  nothing  but  merit  and  accomplishment ;  and 
so  downwards  to  our  own  blundering  efforts  to  get 
a  decent  spirit  of  obedience  and  good  conduct  into 
ivory,  or  even  bonzoline. 

It  is  only  those  that  know  something  of  what  ivory 
107 


Persons  of  Quality 

can  do  and  should  do  under  coaxing  or  compulsion 
who  can  really  appreciate  the  wizardry  of  the  best 
players.  Because  it  really  is  wizardry  —  nothing 
else ;  and  not  the  less  so  through  one's  knowledge 
that  it  has  come  from  a  whole  lifetime  of  practice 
and  thought.  For  he  who  would  play  billiards  like 
one  of  these  must  do  nothing  else.  Billiards  must 
be  his  existence.  A  good  game  can  be  played 
by  men  immersed  at  other  times  in  other  pursuits ; 
but  wizardry  goes  only  to  those  who  not  only  start 
with  a  natural  aptitude,  in  a  billiards  environment, 
but  dedicate  their  bodies  and  minds  to  billiards  as 
completely  and  thoughtfully  as  a  devotee  of  religion. 
To  know  what  to  do  and  to  do  it  accurately  and 
beautifully ;  to  know  not  only  what  one  is  doing 
with  this  stroke,  but  precisely  what  kind  of  position 
will  be  left ;  to  alternate  a  softness  of  touch  beside 
which  the  touch  of  a  butterfly's  wing  were  almost 
gross  with  a  forcing  power  that  would  drive  a  nail 
through  a  plank ;  to  break  the  balls  after  a  series  of 
nurseries  with  such  precision  of  effort  that  they 
reassemble  within  an  inch  after  a  tour  of  the  table 
by  one  of  them ;  and  to  keep  up  these  changing 
tactics,  without  intervals  either  for  consideration 
or  rest,  during  breaks  of  two,  three,  four,  five,  and 
six  hundred  —  only  by  lifelong  devotion  can  these 
marvels  be  accomplished. 

Meeting     Stevenson     casually     one     would     never 
dream  that  this  was  a  champion  of  such  a  delicate 
and  sensitive  game.       He  is  a  compact,   quiet,  and 
108 


H.  W.  Stevenson 

joyless,  almost  saturnine,  looking  man  of  a  prevalent 
type.  His  hair  and  moustache  are  of  the  ordinary 
colour ;  his  height  is  five  feet  seven  inches ;  he  was 
born  in  1874  at  Hull.  He  plays  without  animation, 
but  swiftly,  and  now  and  then  with  the  carelessness 
of  a  master  —  though  never  with  John  Roberts's 
arrogant  insouciance  —  but  for  the  most  part  he 
shows  a  scrupulous  thoughtfulness.  He  is  strong 
in  every  department ;  and  I  would  rather  see  his 
nursery  cannons  than  Recce's  and  his  losing  hazards 
than  Inman's.  In  extricating  himself  from  what 
look  like  impossible  situations  he  can  be  magnifi- 
cent, and  again  he  will  miss  things  so  simple  that 
one  can  but  gasp.  If  his  tactics  were  as  profound 
as  his  technique  he  would  never  be  hard  pressed  by 
any  player ;  but  his  nature  is  simple,  and  he  dislikes 
safety  play.  Left  with  an  impossibility,  he  prefers 
to  go  for  it  rather  than  meet  it  with  retaliatory  guile. 
When  waiting  for  his  turn  he  sits  motionless,  with  his 
cue  vertically  between  his  knees,  and  rarely  watches 
the  game.  In  fact,  he  has  the  impassivity  of  the 
professional  at  its  best,  but  he  has  not  the  fire-proof 
temperament  for  the  game  quite  as  Inman  has,  or 
Roberts.  He  can  be  both  bored  and  depressed.  In 
watching  Stevenson,  one  does  not  feel  that  one  is 
in  the  presence  of  absolutely  the  highest  genius,  but 
absolutely  the  perfect  artist. 

•  Edward    Diggle    is    the    tallest   of    the    group  —  six 

feet,   if  not   more.     He  comes  from   Manchester  and 

talks    like    it :    descriptive    reporters    of    his    matches 

109 


Persons  of  Quality 

call  him  the  Mancunian.  He  was  born  in  1873.  He 
has  a  little  dark  moustache  and  a  long  chin,  and 
looks  delicate,  with  some  of  the  gentle  wistfulness  of 
the  invalid  in  his  face.  Diggle  is  a  classic  player : 
doing  the  soundest  things  without  haste  or  floridity. 
He  advances  to  the  table  slowly,  takes  his  position 
slowly,  grounds  his  heavy  cue  on  the  cloth  for  a 
moment  slowly,  and  then  makes  the  stroke.  He 
breaks  all  the  rules  which  we  are  so  carefully  taught, 
both  as  to  standing  and  as  to  making  strokes ;  but 
he  gets  there.  His  accuracy  is  a  joy,  and  his  own 
particular  top-of-the-table  game  —  a  red  winner  alter- 
nating with  a  cannon  —  although  in  other  hands  it 
might  be  very  monotonous,  is  never,  to  me,  mo- 
notonous in  his.  Why  he  ever  breaks  down  is  a 
mystery ;  but  I  imagine  that  it  is  due  largely  to 
want  of  physique.  Also  Diggle  is,  I  am  told,  some- 
thing of  a  humorist,  and  humorists  are  rarely 
champions  of  anything ;  while  with  him  artistry 
predominates  over  ambition. 

Reece,  of  Oldham,  is  as  different  from  Diggle  as 
can  be  imagined  :  an  all-round  athlete,  very  powerful, 
clean-shaven,  whom  one  might  take  to  be  a  successful 
trainer  or  stud-groom.  He  has  all  the  quietude  of  a 
rich  man's  employee,  together  with  the  air  which 
comes  of  receiving  the  obedience  or  admiration  of 
inferiors.  At  his  best  he  plays  an  exquisite  game. 
His  touch  can  be  perfect.  But  his  safety  tactics  are 
only  second-rate,  he  is  moodier  than  he  ought  to  be, 
and  a  run  of  bad  luck  depresses  and  depreciates  him. 
no 


Melbourne  Inman 

When  playing  Inman  he  is  peculiarly  liable  to  low 
spirits  and  raspiness ;  and  I  don't  wonder,  for  Inman 
is  an  antagonist  requiring  in  his  opponent  an  amount 
of  phlegm  that  all  Holland  could  hardly  supply. 
Reece  certainly  has  it  not. 

Melbourne  Inman  is  indeed  a  hard  nut  to  crack. 
Of  all  the  great  billiard  players  of  the  day  he  alone 
may  be  said  to  be  out  for  blood.  He  is  the  only 
real  fighter.  The  others  are  keen,  no  doubt,  each 
in  his  way;  but  their  keenness  is  tempered  by 
personal  idiosyncrasy  — •  Diggle's  by  a  low  pulse,  for 
example ;  Stevenson's  by  a  master's  disdain ;  but 
Inman  —  Inman  is  on  the  make,  as  we  say,  all 
the  time.  A  little,  lean,  anxious,  watchful  Hebrew, 
aged  thirty-five,  he  is  worth  watching,  if  only  as  an 
object  lesson  in  patience,  thoroughness,  adroitness, 
and  the  art  of  giving  nothing  away.  He  brings  the 
same  care  to  every  stroke,  easy  or  difficult,  taking 
no  risks.  Unlike  the  other  great  players  of  the  day, 
he  has  no  game  of  his  own.  Stevenson,  for 
example,  and  Reece  are  each  always  hoping  to  bring 
the  balls  together  and  nurse  them ;  Diggle  manoeuvres 
the  white  ball  to  the  cushion  side  of  the  red  on  the 
spot  and  makes  lengthy  runs  of  red  winners  and 
cannons  alternately ;  Gray  keeps  the  red  ball  some- 
where between  the  middle  spot  and  the  D,  and 
builds  up  his  score  with  losers  from  it  on  one  side 
or  the  other.  Inman  has  no  specialty,  except  a 
liking  to  be  "in  hand,"  but  employs  all  these  devices 
as  they  occur  with  a  power  peculiar  to  himself  of 
in 


Persons  of  Quality 

leaving  something  on.  The  result  is  that  not  only  is 
he  more  consistent  in  his  breaks  than  his  rivals,  but 
he  is  free  from  the  strain  of  playing  with  their  anxiety 
for  future  combinations.  Yet  he  is  artist  through 
and  through  as  well,  and  it  is  good  to  watch  the  wan 
ghost  of  a  smile  cross  his  face  after  a  great  shot  or 
a  great  fluke.  He  is  the  only  one  of  the  Masters 
whose  expression  ever  relaxes.  He  is  also  the  wiliest 
of  them.  His  astuteness  is  worth  many  points  to 
him ;  and  that  must  be  a  clever  man  who  outwits  him 
in  safety  play. 

Another  reason  for  Inman's  consistent  success  is 
that  there  is  something  antipathetic  in  his  person- 
ality which  seems  to  make  all  his  adversaries  play 
a  little  below  themselves.  What  it  is  is  not  quite 
explicable :  perhaps  the  reaction  of  just  his  sheer 
ambition :  the  knowledge  that  this  man  is  out  ulti- 
mately to  defeat  all  comers  and  has  no  other  purpose 
in  life.  Such  a  spirit  animating  one  competitor 
could  be  seriously  disconcerting  to  the  other. 

Anyway,  there  it  is,  and  even  Diggle,  apathetic 
though  he  is,  can  feel  it;  while,  as  I  have  said,  it  has 
again  and  again  reduced  Reece  to  the  condition  of  a 
jelly-fish.  Personally,  I  have  no  doubt  but  that  Inman 
and  Mephistopheles  are  in  league ;  for  though  I 
have  seen  all  these  players  enjoy  flukes,  —  vols,  as  the 
French  say  so  much  more  vividly,  —  I  have  never 
seen  any  whose  flukes  have  been  so  outrageous  or 
have  come  at  such  opportune  moments  as  Inman's. 
That  he  is  the  luckiest  player  is  beyond  question ; 

112 


John  Roberts 

but  I  think  that,  like  most  lucky  men,  he  deserves 
his  good  fortune,  for  he  is  a  hard  worker  and  he 
never  relaxes,  and  if  all-round-the-table  play  is 
needed  he  will  do  his  best  with  it.  Whatever  he 
does,  he  will  give  the  spectators  an  interesting  time 
and  his  opponent  a  nervous  one. 

Fifthly,  Aiken,  the  Scotchman.  He  is  the  tortoise 
among  these  hares,  and  one  day  will  win.  No 
glamour  whatever,  no  sparkle ;  but  steady,  pains- 
taking excellence.  Perhaps  none  of  them  would 
so  make  an  amateur  unhappy,  for  his  is  more  like 
the  sublimation  of  the  ordinary  man's  play. 

And  the  greatest  of  them  all,  what  of  him  ? 
Happily,  although  he  does  not  play  any  more,  he  is 
still  with  us,  handling  very  ably  a  pen  instead  of 
a  cue.  I  saw  him  last,  after  a  long  interval,  in  1912, 
and  coming  away  from  Thurston's  my  head  was  so 
full  of  his  commanding  personality  that  when  I  was 
asked  by  an  artistic  friend,  meeting  me,  if  I  had 
been  to  the  Old  Masters  and  which  did  I  like  best, 
it  was  impossible  to  reply  anything  but  "Roberts." 
The  monumental  figure  with  the  strong  carven  face 
and  the  white  hair  and  beard  was  the  same  Roberts 
whom  I  had  known  slender  and  black,  save  for  the 
added  dignity  of  years.  A  little  less  brisk :  that 
was  all.  He  still  never  seemed  to  look  at  the  balls 
at  all,  but  merely  made  them  obey  him — as  though 
his  cue  were  a  wand. 

Diverse  and  wonderful  are  the  gifts  of  God  to 
man,  varied  are  the  manifestations  of  human  genius. 
I  113 


Persons  of  Quality 

This  will  repeople  the  world  with  men  and  women 
of  his  imagination,  warm  with  life,  and  we  call  him 
Shakespeare ;  this  will  take  brush  in  hand  and 
evolve  from  wet  paint  new  and  lustrous  aristocrats, 
and  we  call  him  Velasquez ;  and  this  again  will 
stoop  over  a  table  of  slate  covered  with  green  cloth 
and  bend  the  capricious  diabolical  spirit  of  ivory  to 
his  will,  and  we  call  him  Roberts. 

On  the  afternoon  that  I  saw  him  last,  he  scored 
with  a  rapidity  that  left  one  breathless ;  he  made 
difficulties  that  he  might  extricate  himself  from 
them ;  he  was  full  of  fight ;  nothing  but  his  great 
massive  head  was  old.  "The  resource  of  the  man!" 
sighed  my  neighbour.  The  first  break  that  I 
watched  ran  to  170  and  was  cut  short  by  a  missed 
red  loser  so  simple  that  anyone  could  have  made  it. 
But  that  has  always  been  the  great  man's  way :  he 
has  always  disdained  the  easiest.  His  opponent 
followed,  and  by  methods  as  painful  and  deliberate 
as  Roberts's  were  careless  and  swift  made  a  number 
of  excellent  book  cannons.  Roberts  watched  him 
all  the  time :  none  of  the  ordinary  apathy  of  the 
waiting  professional  for  him ;  none  of  Stevenson's 
forlorn  gaze  at  his  polished  boots.  The  old  lion  was 
keen,  he  wanted  the  table  again. 

He  soon  had  it,  and  was  again  away  at  the  gallop, 
and  not  till  the  stroke  with  which  the  break  ended 
did  he  make  one  that  was  not  perfect  —  the  object 
ball  always  as  much  under  control  as  his  own.  Sad 
indeed  that  such  mastery  should  be  killed  by  age. 
114 


Henry  Burstow 

In  any  rightly  constructed  world  John  Roberts  and 
Cinquevalli  would  equally  live  for  ever.  .  .  . 

Watching  Stevenson  one  marvels  and  marvels  — 
and  yet  feels  that  some  day,  if  one  really  gave  one's 
life  to  it,  one  might  be  able  to  play  billiards.  Watch- 
ing John  Roberts  one  is  certain  that  one  never  could. 
That  is  the  difference. 


V.  —  HENRY  BURSTOW 

How  many  songs  do  you  know  ?  That  would  not 
be  a  bad  leading  question  to  a  partner,  say,  at  dinner, 
or  any  new  acquaintance  —  meaning  by  "knowing," 
not  only  the  existence  of  the  song,  but  its  words  and 
music,  and  a  capacity  to  sing  it  at  any  given  moment, 
with  or  without  accompaniment  added.  How  many 
songs  do  I  know  ?  Well,  in  this  embracive  sense  I 
know  none,  Nature  having  denied  me  a  voice ;  but 
in  the  more  meagre  and  contemptible  sense  of  re- 
membering the  words  only  and  venturing,  in  strict 
privacy  —  such  as  in  bathrooms  or  on  hill-tops  —  to 
drone  them,  I  know  perhaps  five  all  through  and  some 
thirty,  in  parts,  imperfectly.  And  you  ?  Fifty, 
perhaps,  but  are  you  always  pleased  to  sing  them, 
no  matter  where  you  may  be  ?  Because  that  is  one 
of  the  chief  differences  between  Henry  Burstow  and 
other  folks.  Henry  Burstow  knows  four  hundred 
and  twenty  songs,  and  they  are  at  the  service  of  any- 

"5 


Persons  of  Quality 

one  that  he  likes.  Not  that  he  can  give  them  as 
roundly  as  he  once  could,  when  he  was  in  his  prime, 
for  he  is  now  eighty -six;  but  he  can  remember 
them  right  enough  and  make  a  brave  show,  and  in 
1906  he  sang  an  average  of  ten  of  an  evening  to  his 
wife  —  beginning  on  her  seventy -eighth  birthday  and 
so  continuing  for  forty  evenings,  in  their  home  at 
Horsham,  where  they  are  still  (1912)  hale  and  jolly. 

In  the  little  book  of  Burstow's  reminiscences  which 
an  admiring  fellow-townsman  has  compiled  from  the 
old  man's  talk,  a  list  of  these  songs  is  given,  begin- 
ning with  a  number  of  Napoleonic  carols  of  the  Last 
Phase  —  such  as  "Boney's  Farewell  to  Paris," 
"Boney's  Lamentation"  and  "Dream  of  Napoleon," 
and  passing  on  to  soldier  songs  —  "Up  with  the 
Standard  of  England,"  and  "Madam,  do  you  know 
my  trade  is  war  ?"  ;  sailor  songs  —  "Joe  the  Marine" 
and  the  "Minute  Gun  at  Sea"  ;  Irish  songs  —  "Larry 
O'Gaff"  and  "Pretty  Susan,  the  Pride  of  Kildare"; 
rustic  songs  —  "My  good  old  father's  farm"  and 
"Butter,  cheese  and  all";  pathetic  ballads  and 
humorous  ballads,  sentimental  songs  and  comic  songs, 
and  a  few  classical  gems,  of  which  "When  other 
lips"  and  "All  among  the  barley"  are  examples. 
Such  is  Henry  Burstow's  repertory,  much  of  which 
he  acquired  from  his  father,  just  by  listening  to  him ; 
and  it  is  no  small  achievement  to  have  lived  a  long 
life  so  tunefully  and  cheerfully  as  he  has  done,  in 
great  request  at  all  jollifications  and  merry-makings 
by  reason  of  this  rare  and  cordial  gift. 
116 


Merry  Sussex  Belfries 

But  that  is  not  all.  Whether  or  not  it  is  a  record 
to  know  at  the  age  of  eighty-five  four  hundred  and 
twenty  songs,  I  cannot  say ;  but  there  is  no  question 
that  Henry  Burstow  is  a  record-holder  in  another 
melodious  direction,  for  he  has  participated  in  ringing 
a  greater  number  of  peals  of  bells  than  any  living 
man.  Bell-ringing  has,  indeed,  been  the  passion  of 
his  life,  song-singing  a  mere  accident,  and  cobbling 
his  trade  purely  as  a  means  of  obtaining  enough  gear 
and  independence  to  enable  him  to  hurry  to  the 
belfry  with  a  mind  at  ease.  He  began  to  ring  at 
Horsham  in  1841,  when  he  was  only  fifteen,  and  in 
1907  he  rang  his  last  peal  of  5040  changes,  at  Billings- 
hurst,  in  Sussex,  himself  at  the  third  rope.  The  bobs 
were  then  called  by  William  Short ;  in  the  old  days 
Henry  Burstow  was  usually  the  caller.  He  gives  a 
list  of  fifty-three  belfries,  mostly  in  Sussex,  in  which 
he  has  rung  changes,  and  in  several  of  which  he  has 
taught  ringing  too.  On  his  wedding-day,  in  1855, 
with  seven  companions,  all  cobblers  like  himself,  he 
rang  from  morn  to  night,  and  at  Warnham  in  1889  he 
was  concerned  in  13,440  changes,  which  occupied 
seven  hours  and  three-quarters.  On  his  sixty-fifth 
birthday,  in  1891,  he  took  part  in  6720  changes  of 
bob-major  in  Horsham  Church,  four  hours  and  six 
minutes  being  required.  So  that  he  has  some  claim 
to  be  honoured  in  his  own  town  and  vicinity  if 
only  for  helping  to  crash  out  so  much  music  over  the 
Sussex  meadows  these  threescore  years. 

Let  me  quote  the  concluding  passage  of  his  bell- 
117 


Persons  of  Quality 

ringing  memories,  a  kind  of  prose  that  (to  our  loss) 
is  not  much  written  now  :  — 

"To  all  brother  campanologists  and  friends  who 
remain  of  the  hundreds  with  whom  I  have  had  the 
pleasure  of  meeting  and  ringing  in  the  above- 
mentioned  belfries  I  hereby  offer  my  kind  regards 
and  thanks  for  the  hearty  welcome  and  good  fellow- 
ship they  have  always  shown  me.  Their  friendship 
has  helped  to  make  light  and  easy  my  advance 
through  every  phase  of  life,  and  given  me  a  very 
pleasant  outlook  upon  human  nature.  I  can,  alas  ! 
never  meet  them  in  their  belfries  again,  but  should 
any  of  them  ever  come  to  Horsham  I  can  give  them 
a  humble  but  warm  welcome  in  my  little  room  at 
28  Spencer's  Road,  where  we  can  still  enjoy,  at  least, 
the  recollections  of  some  of  the  merry  old  peals  we 
have  pulled  together,  and  where  they  can  have  a  few 
songs  from  a  heart  still  warm  and  firm,  if  by  a  voice 
weakened  by  the  inexorable  operation  of  time. 
Peace  to  departed  ringers  whose  bodies  lie  deaf  to 
the  delightful  continuous  sounds  they  once  had  a 
hand  in  creating !  Good  luck  to  all  who  remain  ! 
That  these  latter  may  be  blessed  with  good  health, 
firm  friendships,  and  cheerful  circumstances  as  I  have 
been,  and  maintain  their  interest  in  campanology, 
their  delights  in  the  merry  bell  and  supple  rope  as  I 
have  always  been  able  to  do,  shall  be  my  sincere 
wish  as  long  as  I  live." 

A  cobbler  should  stick  to  his  last,  says  the  proverb. 
118 


A  Water-Colourist 

It  is  a  lie.  He  should,  unless  he  is  a  contentious 
dull  dog,  do  no  such  thing,  but,  when  Nature  has 
given  him  humane  accomplishments,  use  them  for 
the  delectation  of  his  fellows.  The  first  conjurer 
I  ever  knew  was  a  cobbler :  a  real  conjurer,  not  a 
manipulator  of  elaborate  machinery,  but  one  who 
acted  up  to  his  motto,  "The  quickness  of  the  'and 
deceives  the  heye."  Like  Henry  Burstow,  he  stuck 
to  his  last  only  so  far  as  it  was  necessary ;  after 
that,  like  Henry  Burstow,  he  was  an  artist  and  com- 
municator of  pleasure. 


VI.  — A.  W.  RICH 

Mr.  Rich  is  something  of  an  anachronism.  He  has 
a  Georgian  face  and  prematurely  white  hair,  and  in 
knee  breeches  he  would  be  a  perfect  Old  English 
squire,  or  even  an  intellectual  John  Bull.  More- 
over, in  the  year  1913  he  paints  water  colours  which 
are  in  the  great  tradition  of  De  Wint  and  Cotman, 
and  (without  any  imitation)  can  hang  his  work  among 
the  work  of  these  men  with  no  suggestion  of 
incongruity. 

For    years   I    have    valued    the    New    English    Art 

Club's  exhibitions  as  much  because  they  gave  fresh 

opportunities    to    see    Mr.    Rich's    landscapes    as    for 

anything,    and    on    three    separate    occasions    I    have 

119 


Persons  of  Quality 

contrived  to  make  one  of  these  landscapes  my  own ; 
and  then  the  other  day  whom  should  I  run  into  but 
the  painter  himself,  instantly  recognizable  to  any 
one  who  has  seen  Mr.  Orpen's  portrait  of  him  in 
the  grand  manner,  sketch-book  in  hand,  against  the 
open  sky. 

Mr.  Rich  was  born  in  Sussex,  the  county  he  paints 
so  like  a  lover,  in  1856  (seven  years  after  De  Wint's 
death).  His  mother  came  from  Plymouth  (which 
gave  the  world  Reynolds,  Northcote,  and  Hay  don), 
and  his  father  from  Tetbury,  where  there  are  Downs 
too,  but  not  equal  to  those  of  Sussex ;  although  any 
man  who  had  walked  from  that  Gloucestershire  town 
as  far  as  Froster  Hill  or  Birdlip  and  looked  over  the 
Severn  valley  to  the  blue  hills  of  Wales  would  have 
a  better  chance  of  becoming  the  father  of  a  landscape 
painter  than  any  who  had  not  done  this  thing  — 
that  is  to  say,  if  Eugenics  mean  anything.  The  Lives 
of  artists  show  us  that  painters  may  be  divided  into 
two  classes,  those  who  were  encouraged  by  their 
parents  to  draw  and  those  who  were  not  (although 
a  third  group  includes  such  others,  of  whom  Opie  is 
a  good  example,  as  those  whose  mothers  favoured 
the  pencil  and  whose  fathers  deplored  it).  Mr.  Rich 
was  fortunate  in  being  one  of  the  encouraged  group. 
He  was  given  Charles  Knight's  Old  England  when 
only  five,  and  copied  the  cuts  in  it  assiduously,  and 
when  he  was  nine  he  was  taken  to  the  National 
Gallery  for  the  first  time.  His  earliest  love  among 
the  water-colour  men  was  Peter  De  Wint,  but  he 
1 20 


A    Blest  Pair  of  Dancers 

admired  and  studied  also  Paul  Sandby,  Cotman,  and 
John  Varley. 

And  the  result  ?  Well,  for  my  part,  I  find  upon  his 
parallelograms  of  Whatman,  ten  inches  by  eight,  or 
thereabouts,  more  of  the  vital  England  that  I  know 
and  revere  —  beneath  English  sky  and  filled  with 
English  atmosphere  —  than  in  the,  water  colours  of 
any  other  man  now  painting.  He  is  at  once 
stronger  and  truer  than  any  of  his  contemporaries ; 
although  when  it  comes  to  prettiness  he  is  beaten  on 
all  sides.  But  his  austerity  I  like,  and  his  desire 
for  the  secret  too,  leading  him  to  look  deeper  into 
a  wooded  valley  than  anyone,  and  never  to  be  afraid 
of  the  most  fugitive  cloud.  Were  he  ever  inclined 
to  leave  nature  and  take  to  super-nature,  he  could 
make  a  wonderful  dark  tower  for  Childe  Roland's 
quest,  and  such  a  winding  road  beside  a  gloomy  wood 
leading  to  it. 


VII.  —  Two  OF  OUR  CONQUERORS 

GENEE   AND    PAVLOVA 

Although  theirs  the  same  lovely  and  joyous  art,  this 
blest  pair  of  dancers  could  not  well  be  separated  by 
wider  divergences ;  the  one  a  merry  blonde  from  busy, 
prosperous  Denmark ;  the  other  the  product  of  that 
strange,  sombre,  decadent  country  where  East  and 
West  meet  and  barbarism  seems  never  far  distant. 

121 


Persons  of  Quality 

Each  appeals  to  a  different  mood.  When  it  conies 
to  actual  dancing  —  to  the  precision  and  fluidity  of 
the  steps  and  movements  —  there  is  little  to  choose : 
Pavlova  may  be  perhaps  a  shade  more  astoundingly 
accomplished.  But  for  the  most  part  our  preference 
is  not  for  the  execution  but  for  the  executant.  We 
like  Pavlova  best,  or  Genee  best,  according  to  our 
temperament,  or  according,  as  I  say,  to  our  mood. 
Pavlova  is  more  languorous,  more  dangerous,  more 
exotic;  Genee  is  quicker,  gay  and  jocund.  Pavlova 
has  more  than  an  Oriental  suggestion ;  Genee  is  one 
of  us  —  a  Northerner.  Pavlova  is  aufond  melancholy ; 
Genee  is  a  kitten. 

The  Russian  is  more  beautiful ;  she  has,  as  one 
imagines,  a  rarer  beauty  than  any  of  her  most 
illustrious  predecessors,  most  of  whom  had  a  ten- 
dency to  thick  ankles  and  powerful  legs.  Pavlova 
might  never  have  done  anything  but  ride  in  a 
carriage  or  recline  on  a  sofa  —  so  soft  and  graceful  is 
she ;  and  her  shoulders  are  never  to  be  forgotten. 
But  her  face  lacks  expression.  Her  face,  one  says ; 
yet  as  a  matter  of  curious  fact  Pavlova  has  two  faces, 
not  as  Janus  had,  but  as  a  charming  woman  may 
have  who  is  capable  of  apathy.  One  is  amiable,  the 
other  is  set,  and  they  are  strangely  different :  almost 
they  might  belong  to  different  persons.  Pavlova 
has  two  faces  and  only  one  expression  for  each; 
and  here  is  one  of  the  chief  points  of  contrast 
between  herself  and  Genee,  for  Genee  is  not  only  a 
dancer  but  an  actress  with  a  play  and  range  of  ani- 

122 


Genee  and  Pavlova 

mation  on  her  little  mischievous  upturned  features  for 
which  many  an  actress  who  is  actress  and  nothing  else 
would  give  such  of  her  pearls  as  had  not  been  stolen. 

In  a  little  piece  in  which  Genee  has  recently  per- 
formed —  an  episode  in  the  life  of  one  of  the  most 
famous  dancers  of  all,  the  Belgian  Camargo  —  most  of 
the  emotions  pass  across  her  face :  joy,  disappoint- 
ment, triumph,  hope,  fear,  content ;  while  now  and 
then,  as  when  she  pretends  that  the  king  has  repaid 
the  boon,  she  is  the  incarnation  of  roguishness  and 
the  very  spirit  of  teasing. 

Pavlova  would  be  lost  here  —  just  as  Genee  would 
be  lost  in  the  Bacchanale  —  although  not  so  com- 
pletely. Pavlova  one  can  see  making  some  kind  of 
a  brave  effort  with  the  king  and  the  unhappy  young 
soldier,  although  never  to  the  point  of  touching  the 
emotions,  as  Genee  does ;  but  Genee  one  cannot 
imagine  for  a  moment  in  the  amorous  ecstasy  of  that 
wonderful  vintage  riot.  Therein  lies  the  essential 
difference  between  these  two  superb  artists.  Pavlova 
is  for  the  sophisticated  :  Genee  for  the  simple. 


VIII.  —  COUNCILLOR  KOPPEL 

The  other  day  my  roving  eye  alighted  on  this 
paragraph,  similar,  alas !  to  too  many  which  now 
find  their  way  into  print :  — 

"Yet  another  picture  of  considerable  importance 
has  to  be  added  to  the  ever-growing  list  of  Old 
123 


Persons  of  Quality 

Masters  that  have  left  England  never  to  return.  It 
is  the  large  'Tribute  Money,'  by  Rubens,  which 
was  exhibited  at  the  Royal  Academy  last  winter  by 
the  trustees  of  the  late  Miss  M.  A.  Driver.  The 
purchaser  is  Councillor  Koppel,  of  Berlin,  and  the 
purchase  price  is  said  to  be  £10,000." 

And  as  I  read  the  last  sentence  I  smiled,  and 
there  rose  before  me  the  image  of  one  of  the  most 
satisfying  specimens  of  the  genus  collector  I  have 
yet  met  (and  may  I  meet  many  more !)  moving 
quietly  in  his  small,  but  exquisite,  Berlin  gallery. 
I  saw  him  again,  a  white-haired  old  gentleman,  with 
a  heavy  white  moustache,  dressed  all  in  black,  very 
hospitable  and  friendly  to  the  stranger,  bringing  the 
magnifying  glass  for  me  the  better  to  discern  the 
very  Vermeerish  figures  which  Adrian  Van  de  Velde 
(or  why  not  Van  der  Heyden  himself  ?)  inserted  in 
a  Van  der  Heyden  street  scene,  perhaps  the  best 
example  in  existence,  beyond  even  those  at  Hertford 
House ;  referring  to  a  notebook  for  the  history  of 
this  picture  and  that;  gently  murmuring  extolling 
phrases  in  soothing  broken  English  as  we  paused 
before  his  masterpieces  one  by  one;  pointing  out 
the  best  angle  from  which  to  see  each ;  and  all  the 
while  himself  so  perceptibly  happy  to  be  again 
admiring  what  he  had  admired  so  often  before,  and 
will,  I  hope,  be  spared  to  admire  for  many  years 
yet. 

It  is  a  small  room  built  for  its  purpose  and  given 
wholly  to  the  few  but  fitting,  with  a  table  in  the 
124 


A  German  Collector 

midst  laden  with  books  on  painting.  Sitting  here 
now,  with  my  eyes  tightly  closed,  I  find  I  can 
reconstruct  most  of  each  wall,  which  says  more  for 
the  force  of  their  owner's  personality  than  many 
sentences  could,  for  it  is  only  because  he  was  there 
too,  with  his  lulling  phrases  of  enthusiasm,  that  I  have 
the  scene  so  clear.  You  enter  to  Rembrandt,  on 
the  right  of  the  door  in  the  end  wall  being  a  portrait, 
of  the  old  giant  himself,  late  in  life,  when  the  stress 
of  it  all  had  begun  to  tell,  and  on  the  left  a  land- 
scape, tiny  in  size,  but  vast  in  effect,  two  small 
portraits,  and  the  very  beautiful  "Christ  and  the 
Woman  of  Samaria,"  with  a  fine  burst  of  sky  above 
them.  On  the  right  wall  is  a  Nicholas  Maes,  of  a 
quality  equal  to  the  great  Ryks  "Prayer,"  but  not  a 
fourth  its  size ;  a  tiny  Paul  Potter,  which  one  would 
not  exchange  for  a  herd  of  his  Hague  "Bulls";  a 
green  mound  with  a  fringe  of  trees  on  it  washed 
with  something  very  like  an  Albert  Cuyp  light ;  and 
a  Jacob  Ruysdael  "paysage"  :  a  road  between  a  canal 
and  a  wood,  with  light  through  the  branches,  and 
more  foretastes  of  Barbizon  than  often  gathered  in  a 
seventeenth-century  canvas. 

The  large  portrait  in  the  centre  of  this  wall  (each 
has  one)  is  a  Mierevelt :  a  Dutch  lady  in  black  with 
a  ruff ;  and  soon  after  we  are  before  that  glancing 
brilliant  thing,  the  Van  der  Heyden,  a  painter  whose 
special  joy  and  triumph  it  was  to  transmute  bricks 
and  mortar  to  jewels.  After  the  Van  der  Heyden 
I  am  a  little  misty  among  peasants.  Jan  Steen, 

125 


Persons  of  Quality 

Ostade,  and  Teniers  I  remember,  though  not  too 
distinctly ;  and  then  comes  the  great  Hals  with  a 
commanding  portrait  of  a  woman,  the  head  not  so 
miraculously  done  as  in  some,  but  a  left  hand  with 
gloves  in  it  that  is  nearer  magic  than  craftsmanship. 
Again  I  am  a  little  misty,  this  time  amid  landscapes ; 
I  remember  only  vaguely  another  Ruysdael,  not 
so  good  as  the  last,  an  Aert  Van  der  Neer,  a  be- 
calmed sea  by  Van  der  Goyen,  a  Cuyp,  a  Wouwermans 
battlepiece,  and  then  everything  is  vivid  again  before 
one  of  the  most  glorious  Van  Dycks  in  existence  — 
a  countess  from  Genoa  —  painted  during  his  Italian 
period,  rich  and  sympathetic  and  profound.  Above 
it  is  a  child  by  Rubens ;  but  where  the  new  Rubens 
is  to  go  —  if,  indeed,  it  is  meant  for  this  room  —  I 
cannot  imagine.  It  is  surely  too  large,  too  restless. 
This  room  is  for  placid  work. 

And  why  did  I  smile  when  I  read  the  paragraph  ? 
Because  I  remembered  the  whisper  in  which  Coun- 
cillor Koppel  informed  me,  not  without  a  twinkle, 
that  nearly  every  picture  in  his  collection  came  from 
England.  And  now  another  !  Well,  he  is  almost 
the  only  foreigner  to  whom  I  would  not  grudge 
them,  for  he  has  a  heart  for  painting. 


126 


The  Jolly  Good  Fellows          -cy        <^y        *^y 

T^INDING  myself  alone  in  London  one  night 
JL  recently,  I  wandered  into  a  large  and  exclusively 
English  restaurant  not  far  from  the  juncture  of 
Kingsway  and  Holborn ;  and  there  I  lingered  long 
over  a  very  late  dinner  or  early  supper,  while  one  by 
one  the  other  guests  vanished.  A  time  came  when 
I  realized  that  save  for  the  waiters  I  had  the  place 
to  myself  —  a  condition  of  things  which  suited  the 
somewhat  anti-social  brooding  mood  into  which  I 
had  fallen,  when  suddenly  the  muffled  strains  of  a 
familiar  chant  took  my  ear,  and  I  was  aware  that  at 
a  banquet  in  one  of  the  many  large  private  dining- 
rooms  of  the  building  one  of  the  company  was  being 
toasted,  and  all  the  other  guests  were  on  their 
feet  singing  to  the  prescribed  tune  the  form  of 
words  prescribed  for  such  occasions.  Every  one 
knows  it. 

The  sound  brought  the  scene  before  me  as  vividly 

almost  as  if  I  were  there.     I  could  see  the  honoured 

guest  sitting  a  little  confused  under  the  compliment, 

its    cloying    sweetness    so    long    and    embarrassingly 

127 


The  Jolly  Good  Fellows 

drawn  out.  I  fancied  him  not  quite  knowing  where 
to  look,  toying  with  a  fork  or  his  cigar  as  some  kind 
of  solace  or  support;  while  the  others,  each  holding 
a  glass,  roared  out"  this  almost  national  anthem, 
beaming  upon  him  as  they  did  so,  or  laughingly 
catching  each  other's  eyes. 

So  I  saw  the  scene  first,  considering  the  recipient 
of  the  honour  a  novice  and  rather  proud  of  his  popu- 
larity ;  but  then  it  occurred  to  me  that  he  might  be 
no  novice  at  all  but  one  inured  to  the  flattery  —  it 
might  have  been  his  portion  for  years,  for  there  is 
something  chronic  about  jolly  good  fellowship  — 
and  so  far  from  faltering  beneath  the  unction,  he 
might  be  criticising  a  fancied  want  of  cordiality  and 
comparing  the  occasion  with  others  to  its  disad- 
vantage ;  might  even  under  his  brows  be  detecting 
here  and  there  a  silent  mouth  or  a  satirical  glint  in 
an  eye ;  might  be  appraising  too  curiously  the 
volume  of  sound,  or  speculating  on  which  of  the 
singers  —  all  inferior  men  to  himself  —  was,  by  being 
the  next  guest  so  honoured,  to  diminish  the  homage, 
until,  as  the  evening  wore  on  and  the  compliment 
had  been  too  often  repeated,  it  would  have  sunk  to 
a  mere  perfunctory  ritual.  (He,  however,  was  the 
first.) 

And  I  wondered  a  little,  too,  as  to  who  began  this 
particular  song,  for  such  things  are  always  the  work 
of  one  man.  Occasionally,  I  remembered,  the  pro- 
poser of  the  toast  himself  gives  the  signal  for 
musical  honours  (as  they  are  called),  but  more  often 
128 


"With  Musical  Honours" 

it  is  some  warm-blooded,  impulsive  fellow  among  the 
crowd.  I  seemed  to  see  him  —  one  of  the  confident 
men  with  a  voice  full  of  assurance  whom  in  one's 
looser  moments  one  envies  so  —  holding  up  his  hand 
and  beginning  the  long  first  note,  "Fo-o-o-r,"  and 
the  others  gradually  joining  in  with  "he's  a  jolly 
good  fellow,"  and  launching  the  litany  once  more 
into  being.  And  was  there  ever  a  case,  I  wondered, 
where  the  rest  of  the  company  had  refused  to  join 
in  ?  and  if  so,  how  did  the  initiator  bear  it  ?  Do 
such  men  feel  affronts  ?  To  me,  who  can  be  daunted 
by  the  smile  of  a  total  stranger  in  the  street  (and  he 
probably  thinking  of  something  else),  this  is  an 
interesting  question.  And  as  I  reached  this  point 
in  my  idle  thoughts,  once  again  the  chant  sounded, 
and  I  realized  that  already  the  honour  had  begun  to 
lose  its  fine  edge.  There  was  danger  that  the  place 
was  about  to  be  overdone  with  jolly  good  fellows. 

Thus  sitting  there,  all  alone  in  my  solitude,  I  went 
on  to  wonder  what  it  means  to  be  a  jolly  good 
fellow :  how  they  do  it :  what  alterations  in  one's 
own  speech  and  habits,  for  example,  would  be 
necessary  before  one  also  could  become  a  target  for 
this  festive  concerto.  Must  not  one  be  rather 
underlined,  rather  powerful,  certainly  no  friend  to 
anonymity  ?  And  with  one's  preference  for  in- 
dividual treatment  and  dislike  of  generalizing  con- 
ventions, should  one  like  it  if  it  did  happen  ?  All 
men  being  different,  there  seemed  to  be  something 
wrong  about  so  universal  and  undiscriminating  a 
K  129 


The  Jolly  Good  Fellows 

form    of    compliment ;     but    perhaps    the    jolly    good 
fellows  are  all  alike. 

My  thoughts  wandered  on  to  the  jolly  good 
fellows'  wives.  Were  they  jolly  too  ?  And  good  ? 
Would  they  be  proud  and  happy  when  their 
husbands  told  them  the  news  of  to-night's  triumph, 
or  would  they  have  still  another  problem  to  solve  as 
to  the  incomprehensible  nature  of  man  ?  Or  would 
they  forestall  the  news  by  sarcastic  comment : 
"Well,  I  suppose  you  were  the  usual  jolly  good 
fellow  again  ?  It's  not  so  difficult  at  public  dinners 
as  at  home,  is  it  ?" 

And  I  wondered,  too,  if  there  were  any  men  in 
the  room  near  me  who  had  long  nourished  the 
ambition  to  be  sung  at  like  this,  but  could  never 
contrive  to  be  jolly  enough ;  or  at  any  rate  who 
lacked  some  quality  — -  perhaps  influence  —  to  procure 
the  ecstasy.  There  may  be  men  —  so  little  we  know 
of  each  other  —  who  have  died  lamenting  the  loss  of 
this  manifestation  of  success.  There  may  be  gener- 
ous creatures  who  have  begun  these  musical  honours 
—  sounded  the  first  note  tentatively  or  with  confi- 
dence —  for  scores  and  scores  of  fellow-diners,  and  by 
their  very  generosity  (for  it  is  an  obliterating  quality) 
have  been  themselves  overlooked  all  their  lives.  While 
I  continued  idly  to  sit  there,  and  the  real  supping 
parties  were  beginning  to  enter,  I  was  conscious  that 
the  public  dinner  whose  vocal  quality  had  given  rise 
to  all  these  thoughts  and  speculations  was  by  no 
means  the  only  one  then  proceeding  in  this  great 


The  Question 

building.  The  notes  of  the  same  chant  were  reaching 
me  more  or  less  distinctly  from  crowded  tables  in  two 
other  banqueting  rooms ;  and  I  paid  my  bill  and 
emerged  into  the  street  stunned  by  the  realization 
of  how  many  jolly  good  fellows  the  world  contains, 
and  how  fair  a  lot  to  fill  is  left  to  each  man  still, 
and  the  question,  Would  I  really  try  to  be  one  also  ? 


Thoughts  on  Magic          ^>       *c^       *QV       «o 

I  WAS  present  the  other  day  at  one  of  those 
discussions  on  conjuring  which  everybody  must 
know.  One  of  the  party  had  just  seen  a  conjurer 
and  had  been  perplexed  by  a  trick.  He  first 
described  the  trick,  and  then  we  suggested  different 
ways  in  which  it  might  have  been  done,  of  all  of 
which  he  was  scornful.  At  last  he  was  asked  if,  then, 
he  considered  the  conjurer  a  real  wizard  employing 
actual  magic  ?  He  disclaimed  any  frame  of  mind  so 
absurd ;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact,  that  is  what  he 
wanted  to  think,  and  that  is  what  we  all  want  to 
think  when  we  see  a  conjurer,  and  ever  shall  want. 
For  magic  is  poor  human  nature's  dearest  desire. 

Old  people  know  it  is  not  for  them;  middle-aged 
people  suspect  sadly  it  is  not  for  them;  but  children 
—  and  so  many  of  us  are  always  children  —  long  for 
it  hopefully.  A  ban  on  fairy-tales  would,  of  course, 
be  powerful  to  check  such  a  longing;  but  nothing 
could  wholly  eradicate  it.  In  my  early  days  I  was 
divided  as  to  what  magical  thing  I  most  wanted  — 
whether  it  was  a  packet  of  fern-seed  to  make  me 
132 


The  Three  Wishes 

invisible,  or  a  purse  that  always  had  money  in  it,  or 
a  flying  carpet.  Then  I  came  across  the  wishing- 
cap,  and,  of  course,  fixed  upon  that,  because  one 
could  then  wish  for  invisibility,  or  wealth,  or  travel, 
at  will. 

Yet  even  as  a  child  I  remember  feeling  that  there 
was  something  a  little  too  wholesale  about  this  cap. 
It  did  too  much.  I  contrasted  it  with  that  commoner 
apparatus  of  the  fairy-tale,  the  article  which  confers 
three  wishes  only,  and  I  decided,  with  a  fumbling 
towards  the  truer  romance,  that  thus  to  limit  the 
ambition  was  both  more  just  and  more  interesting. 
Yet  there  again  I  always  found  myself  wondering 
why  the  first  wish  was  not  for  a  wishing-cap ;  and 
indeed  the  folly  of  the  wishers  in  all  the  stories  of 
the  three  wishes  is  perhaps  many  a  child's  first 
glimpse  of  real  miserable  misfortune,  beyond  any  of 
the  more  cunningly-manufactured  material,  such  as 
Misunderstood  and  similar  narratives.  I  can  still 
recall  the  fury  I  felt  that  such  a  gift  should  have 
been  entrusted  to  those  stupid  peasants  whose  first 
wish  (by  the  wife)  was  for  a  ladle,  the  second  (by 
the  angry  husband)  that  it  might  stick  in  her  mouth, 
and  the  third  (by  the  wife)  that  it  might  be  extracted 
again.  That  such  a  chance  should  have  come  and 
have  been  so  wasted  desolated  me  more  than  any 
aggregation  of  Sophoclean  disasters  could  have  done. 
This  was  tragedy,  if  you  like. 

Wishing  was  probably  never  better  managed  than 
in  "The  Tinder  Box,"  always  my  favourite  fairy- 

133 


Thoughts  on  Magic 

story.  That  was  my  choicest  hero  for  many  years  — 
the  soldier  home  from  the  wars  who,  when  he  struck 
the  flint  which  gave  him  what  he  wanted,  always 
wanted  the  right  thing.  He  made  no  mistakes. 

Thinking  it  over,  I  find  that  I  never  unreservedly 
accepted  magic.  I  liked  it  only  when  I  liked  it. 
Scepticism  was  just  round  the  corner.  For  example, 
I  liked  fern-seed,  and  caps  or  cloaks  of  invisibility, 
and  I  liked  bottomless  purses  (immensely) ;  but  I 
did  not  like  seven-league  boots.  I  could  understand 
vaguely  but  sufficiently  those  other  lenitives  of  a 
drab  life ;  but  I  could  not  understand  seven-league 
boots.  I  could  not  see  how  one's  legs  could  stretch 
so  far,  irrespective  of  foot-gear.  Seven  leagues,  I 
discovered,  were  twenty-one  miles,  the  distance  from 
Dover  to  Calais,  and  it  bothered  me.  I  wondered 
to  a  point  of  desperation  how  one  reached  a  place 
that  was,  say,  only  five  leagues  away.  Could  one 
take  a  short  step  ?  These  little  worries  irritated  me, 
although  I  accepted  Perseus's  winged  sandals  quite 
naturally. 

The  only  blot  on  "The  Tinder  Box,"  which  I 
consider  the  best  comic  fairy-story  ever  written,  was 
the  size  of  the  dogs'  eyes.  These  were  just  ordinary 
dogs,  capable  of  being  lifted  and  seated  on  an  old 
woman's  apron,  and  yet  the  eyes  of  one  were  as  big 
as  saucers,  of  another  mill-wheels,  and  of  the  third 
towers  —  meaning,  I  suppose,  the  tops  of  circular 
towers.  That  description  came  perilously  near  ruin- 
ing it  for  me;  but  the  rest  saved  it.  Still  I  do  not 
134 


"The  Tinder  Box" 

absolve  Andersen  from  a  blemish.  It  is  perhaps  the 
only  one  in  all  his  adorable  pages.  "Cinderella," 
which  is  of  course  the  best  fairy-tale  of  all,  perfect 
in  ingredients,  perfect  in  arrangement,  and  perfect 
in  its  end,  has  no  such  fault.  I  could  believe  every 
word  of  it;  and  then  "Cinderella"  has  tenderness 
too,  whereas  "The  Tinder  Box"  is  all  farce  and 
swagger.  But  how  good  ! 

I  am  writing  of  feelings  that  are  past.  To  meet 
with  the  supernatural  in  any  form  whatever  in  a 
novel  of  to-day  causes  me  to  lay  down  the  book  — 
unless,  of  course,  Mr.  Anstey  is  the  author.  The 
others  —  the  serious  ones  —  who  revive  the  dead,  or 
transfuse  blood  and  personality,  or  accumulate  ghosts, 
or  visit  the  future,  or  converse  with  spirits  —  these  I 
send  back  to  the  library  by  return  of  post.  I  am 
too  old  for  any  magic  but  the  magic  of  Nature :  the 
magic,  for  instance,  that  educes  a  flaming  hollyhock 
eight  feet  high  from  a  little,  dry,  dark  chip  in  a 
penny  packet,  and  from  a  speckled  blue  and  black 
egg  an  inch  long  calls  forth  a  bird  which  sings 
divinely  through  the  April  rain.  But  I  still  think 
"The  Tinder  Box"  one  of  the  best  stories  in  the 
world. 


135 


Tom  Girtin      -<cy      ^y      -o      *^>      ^y      o 

A  DEALER  (the  story  runs),  calling  one  morn- 
A\  ing  in  a  hackney  coach  on  Turner,  and  looking 
over  the  works  in  his  studio,  said,  "These  are  very 
fine,  Mr.  Turner,  but  I  have  brought  something 
finer  with  me."  "I  don't  know  what  that  can 
be,"  was  the  reply,  "unless  it's  Tom  Girtin's  'White 
House  at  Chelsea.'" 

And  again,  long  after,  the  same  painter,  who  sur- 
vived Girtin  by  forty-nine  years  and  left  an  immense 
fortune,  was  heard  to  remark,  "Had  Girtin  lived  I 
should  have  starved";  while  Constable  used  to  say 
that  the  study  of  thirty  Girtin  drawings  lent  to  him 
by  Sir  George  Beaumont  completely  changed  the 
trend  of  his  genius. 

And  who  was  the  candid,  powerful,  innovating 
young  hand  of  whom  these  masters  spoke  ?  Thomas 
Girtin,  the  son  of  a  Southwark  ropemaker,  was  born 
on  February  18th,  in  1775,  eight  days  after  Charles 
Lamb.  His  first  master  was  Edward  Dayes,  a  water- 
colour  painter  and  engraver,  who  practised  all  his 
life  that  blue-grey  tinting  which  Girtin  and  Turner 
began  with,  but  soon  abandoned.  Dayes,  a  dis- 
136 


Dr.  Monro 

agreeable  man  but  fine  artist  (a  perfectly  possible 
combination),  had  a  short  way  with  apprentices  who 
showed  signs  of  revolt,  and  Girtin  found  himself  in 
the  Fleet  for  breaking  his  indentures.  There  he 
covered  his  walls  with  sketches  which  the  Earl  of 
Essex  chanced  to  see,  and  his  lordship  procured  the 
boy's  release  both  from  prison  and  from  Dayes. 
Girtin  next  associated  himself  with  a  genial  and 
convivial  painter  and  engraver  named  John  Raphael 
Smith,  in  whose  studio  he  found  a  promising, 
although  somewhat  anti-social,  youth  of  his  •  own  age 
named  Turner,  the  son  of  a  Maiden  Lane  barber. 
English  artists  no  longer  have  such  humble  begin- 
nings as  these  twain,  but  they  do  not,  it  is  thought, 
paint  any  the  better  for  it.  Together  the  boys  tinted 
Smith's  mezzotints  :  while  under  Smith  it  is  possible, 
too,  that  Girtin  learned  that  life  was  not  wholly 
devoid  of  beer  and  skittles. 

Few  cities  —  probably  none  —  are  visited  by  such 
industrious  and  enthusiastic  hero-worshippers  as 
London,  tireless  in  their  desire  to  stand  reverently 
in  historic  spots  and  gaze  with  awe  and  rapture 
upon  the  abodes  of  great  men.  But  who  has  ever 
seen  a  knot  of  admirers,  or  even  a  rapt  individual, 
before  No.  8  Adelphi  Terrace?  Yet  it  was  there 
that  Dr.  Thomas  Monro  lived,  and  it  was  Monro 
who  was  the  principal  encourager  of  the  young 
water-colourists  of  that  day  —  from  Cozens  to  Cot- 
man  —  not  only  giving  them  the  good  supper  they 
probably  only  too  badly  needed,  but  a  few  shillings 

137 


Tom  Girtin 

besides,    together   with   stimulating   counsel   and   the 
opportunity  to  copy  great  masters. 

Monro  was  on  the  staff  of  Bethlehem  Hospital, 
and  when  poor  Cozens,  who  among  their  prede- 
cessors had  most  of  the  divine  fire  which  Girtin 
and  Turner  were  to  tend,  went  mad,  the  Doctor 
cared  for  him ;  while  he  not  only  gathered  young 
men  about  him  at  No.  8,  but  took  them  on  sketch- 
ing excursions  around  London.  Altogether,  for  his 
services  to  British  water-colour  painting  he  deserves 
a  statue  of  gold  in  the  Victoria  and  Albert  Museum ; 
but  he  does  not  possess  one.  There  is  not  even  a 
tablet  on  his  house. 

But  Monro  did  not  exhaust  the  stimulating 
influence  of  Adelphi  Terrace,  for  next  door  lived 
John  Henderson,  who  also  had  taste  and  the  sense 
of  patronage ;  and  to  one  or  other  of  these  houses, 
but  chiefly  Monro's,  the  two  youths  Girtin  and 
Turner  went,  evening  after  evening,  when  their  work 
for  Smith  was  done,  and  either  made  original  draw- 
ings, or  tinted  outlines,  or  copied  from  Canaletto, 
Gainsborough,  Piranesi,  or  Cozens  himself.  Mr. 
Binyon  considers  that  the  influence  upon  both 
youths  of  the  Adelphi  Canalettos  cannot  be  over- 
estimated, and  Turner,  who  was  not  often  articu- 
lately grateful,  later  in  life  painted  a  picture  in 
which  his  indebtedness  to,  or  at  any  rate  admiration 
of,  the  Venetian  painter  is  recorded.  Most  of  the 
British  Museum  Girtins  and  Cozens  are  from  Hender- 
son's collection. 

138 


A  Band  of  Brothers 

When  the  time  came  to  leave  London  Girtin  fell 
in  with  a  travelling  antiquary  and  amateur  artist, 
named  James  Moore,  and  accompanied  him  on 
various  extended  tours  in  the  North.  He  also  once 
went  to  Scotland  by  sea  with  that  dangerous  char- 
acter, George  Morland,  who  not  only  strongly 
objected  to  be  sober  himself  but  disliked  his  com- 
panions to  be  so ;  but  there  is  no  good  evidence 
that  Girtin  did  more  at  any  time  than  prefer 
Bohemianism  to  staidness,  and  was  open-handed, 
warm-hearted,  and  beloved  by  all  who  knew  him  — 
always  excepting  Edward  Dayes. 

This  artistic  zeal  and  cheery  friendliness  led  him, 
in  the  late  nineties,  to  establish  an  artists'  club,  the 
members  of  which  met  at  each  other's  houses  or 
lodgings,  and  drew,  ate,  and  joked ;  among  them  being 
Cotman,  Francia,  later  the  instructor  of  Bonington 
(who  was  not  yet  born),  Calcott,  afterwards  Sir 
Augustus,  and  Ker  Porter,  afterwards  Sir  Robert, 
brother  of  Jane  Porter,  who  wrote  The  Scottish 
Chiefs  and  made  use  of  some  of  her  brother's 
experiences  as  a  young  artist  in  her  Thaddeus  of 
Warsaw.  But  Turner  was  not  a  member ;  his  genius 
lay  outside  such  sodalities ;  he  worked  alone,  almost 
in  secret,  and  saved  his  money. 

Thus  Girtin  lived,  marrying  early,  travelling 
much,  always  kindly,  always  busy,  almost  always 
inspired,  changing  his  abode  often,  until  his  pre- 
mature death,  from  consumption,  in  1802,  at  the 
early  age  of  twenty-seven.  He  was  buried  in  St. 

139 


Tom  Girtin 

Paul's,  Covent  Garden,  and  Turner  was  at  his 
funeral.  Indeed  it  is  said  that  Turner  paid  for  his 
gravestone ;  and  I  hope  it  is  true. 

Of  "The  White  House  at  Chelsea,"  which  is 
Girtin's  masterpiece,  there  are  two  versions,  of  which 
the  finer,  and  probably  the  first,  belongs  to  Mr. 
Micholls,  who  has  kindly  allowed  me  to  reproduce 
it  as  the  frontispiece  to  this  book.  The  picture, 
which  was  epoch-making,  is  one  of  the  earliest  —  if 
not  quite  the  earliest  —  transcripts  of  the  romantic 
beauty  and  mystery  of  the  Thames,  and  nothing 
has  more  serenity  and  charm.  One  can  under- 
stand, as  one  looks  at  the  original,  what  Turner 
meant  in  his  remark  to  the  dealer,  and  how  it  is 
that  English  art  has  never  been  the  same  since  it 
was  painted.  It  is  one  of  the  constructive  pictures : 
a  work  with  no  influence  before  it,  save  the  desire 
to  be  true  and  beautiful,  but  enormous  influences  in 
its  wake. 


140 


My  Walks  Abroad         <^y        <^y        *QV        ^y 

I.  —  OPHRYS  APIFERA 

I  HAD  always  wanted  to  find  one  for  myself, 
unaided,  but  I  had  never  done  so.  Last  year  a 
friend  led  me  up  the  slopes  of  Wolstonbury  and 
turned  me  loose  on  a  small  area  where  it  was  known 
to  grow,  and  very  soon,  sure  enough,  a  specimen  came 
to  hand ;  but  that  is  not  the  real  thing.  It  is  almost 
like  buying  a  bird's  egg  for  a  collection,  although  of 
course,  not  really  base,  as  that  is. 

Hence  when  suddenly,  on  our  own  hillside, 
thinking  of  something  else,  I  saw  the  beautiful 
flower  at  my  feet,  no  wonder  I  was  excited ;  and  I 
still  am.  It  was  one  of  the  peaks  of  Darien  that 
all  of  us  cherish. 

Really  it  is  a  most  exquisite  flower,  without  being 
too  exquisite.  That,  of  course,  is  the  danger  it  runs, 
but  it  is  avoided.  The  green  of  the  stem  is  so  light 
and  radiant ;  the  stem  itself  so  firm  and  straight ; 
the  blossoms  are  set  on  it  with  such  proud  distinc- 
tion ;  the  purple  of  the  petal  is  so  gay  and  pure  and 
141 


My  Walks  Abroad 

rare.  And  then  there  is  its  magic  and  wonder  too 
—  the  delightful  resemblance  to  a  bee.  That  there 
should  be  a  bee  in  a  flower,  or  on  a  flower,  is  the 
most  natural  thing  possible.  But  that  a  flower 
should  actually  be  a  bee  —  that  is  a  miracle.  All 
flowers,  of  course,  are  miracles,  but  this  is  a  miracle 
beyond  most. 

And  the  diversity  of  flowers  !  —  here  one  actually  is 
face  to  face  with  a  profound  and  moving  mystery. 
Why  flowers  were  made  at  all :  there  is  problem 
enough  there  for  the  most  avid  inquirer,  particularly 
as  the  solution  must  ever  escape  him ;  and  then  why 
flowers  were  made  in  such  variety  and  profusion, 
since  were  there  fewer  no  one  would  miss  those  that 
had  never  been  made.  Why,  for  example,  does  my 
botany-book  contain  ten  coloured  plates  each  devoted 
to  from  five  to  seven  kinds  of  wild  parsley,  when  one 
wild  parsley  would  (I  imagine)  do  ? 

Flowers,  I  take  it  (using  as  much  human  reason- 
ing power  as  was  allotted  me),  were  made  either  to 
gladden  the  eye  of  man  and  make  him  more  con- 
tented with  the  earth,  or  as  medicines  and  fodder, 
or  to  provide  bees  with  honey,  or  perhaps  for  all 
these  purposes.  What  amount  of  honey  the  Ophrys 
apifera  yields  I  have  no  notion ;  but  there  is  some- 
thing very  charming  in  the  idea  of  Flora  reproducing 
in  vegetable  form  this  little  industrious  friend  and 
ally  of  hers  —  fixing  him  for  ever  on  the  stalk  of  this 
shy,  distinguished  plant,  just  as  a  Japanese  artist 
sets  a  mother-of-pearl  butterfly  on  a  screen :  so  that 
142 


The  Bee-Orchis 

if  at  any  time,  by  some  dreadful  and  unthinkable 
calamity,  all  the  hives  were  destroyed  and  every 
drone  and  worker  in  the  world  exterminated,  we 
might  still  be  charmingly  informed  as  to  what 
they  were  like  by  hunting  (as  I  have  been  doing 
every  day  for  a  fortnight)  on  the  thymy  slopes  of  a 
chalk  down  until  we  found  a  bee-orchis. 

For  you  must  not  believe  the  papers  —  they  were 
at  it  again  the  other  day,  after  the  Holland  House 
show  —  when  they  pretend  that  the  only  orchid- 
hunting  that  has  any  romance  or  excitement  in  it 
is  that  in  the  tropics,  as  described  so  vividly  by  Mr. 
Frederick  Boyle.  The  English  orchid-hunter  may 
not  run  the  risks  of  swamp-fever  and  snake-bites, 
nor,  happily,  will  his  efforts  yield  such  golden 
returns ;  but  everything  else  he  has  —  the  pleasure 
of  the  chase,  the  rapture  of  the  find,  the  adventures 
by  the  way,  and,  above  all,  England. 

I  once  had  an  Uncle  Charles,  who  belonged  to  the 
old  school  of  naturalists  and  sportsmen  —  that  is  to 
say,  what  he  owned  in  the  way  of  specimens  he  had 
obtained  unaided  save  by  his  own  eyes,  his  own  legs, 
his  own  hands,  his  own  gun,  or  his  own  dog.  A 
bachelor,  he  had  time  for  such  pursuits,  and  his  rooms 
were  lined  with  cases  of  birds,  and  his  head  was  stored 
with  the  knowledge  of  the  field  and  the  wood.  Among 
other  things  that  he  knew  was  the  home  of  the  rarer 
wild  flowers  of  Sussex.  But  do  you  think  he  would 
tell  anyone  ?  Not  he.  The  man-orchis,  the  fly-orchis, 
the  butterfly-orchis,  the  frog-orchis,  the  bee-orchis 
143 


My  Walks  Abroad 

—  he  had  a  cache  of  each  kind  in  his  memory  and 
could  go  straight  to  the  spot  at  the  right  time. 
But  he  would  not  tell.  "No,"  he  would  say, 
"that's  my  secret.  But  I  will  make  an  exception 
in  your  favour.  I  will  tell  you  more  than  I  ever 
told  anyone  else.  I  get  out  at  Balcombe  Station." 
Somewhat  in  this  way  do  I  intend  to  address  in- 
quirers who  ply  me  too  narrowly  as  to  the  habitat 
of  the  bee-orchis.  Such  secrets  must  be  kept. 


II.  —  THE  BATS 

(Written  in  February} 

There  is  a  street  in  London  called  Cranbourn 
Street,  which  serves  no  particular  purpose  of  its  own, 
but  is  useful  as  leading  from  Long  Acre  and  Garrick 
Street  to  the  frivolous  delights  of  the  Hippodrome, 
and  serviceable  also  in  the  possession  of  a  Tube 
station  from  which  one  may  go  to  districts  of 
London  as  diverse  as  Golder's  Green  and  Hammer- 
smith. These  to  the  ordinary  eye  are  the  principal 
merits  of  Cranbourn  Street.  But,  to  the  eye  which 
more  minutely  discerns,  it  has  deeper  and  finer 
riches :  it  has  a  shop  window  with  a  little  row  of 
cricket  bats  in  it  so  discreetly  chosen  that  they  not 
only  form  a  vivid  sketch  of  the  history  of  the 
greatest  of  games  but  enable  anyone  standing  at 
the  window  and  studying  them  to  defeat  for  the 
144 


A  Royal  Cricketer 

moment  the  attack  of  the  dreariest  of  weather 
and  for  a  brief  but  glorious  space  believe  in  the  sun 
again. 

And  what  of  the  treasures  ?  Well,  to  begin  with, 
the  oldest  known  bat  is  here  —  a  dark  lop-sided  club 
such  as  you  see  in  the  early  pictures  in  the  pavilion 
of  Lord's,  that  art  gallery  which  almost  justifies  rain 
during  a  match,  since  it  is  only  when  rain  falls  that 
one  examines  it  with  any  care.  Of  this  bat  there  is 
obviously  no  history,  or  it  would  be  written  upon  it, 
and  the  fancy  is  therefore  free  to  place  it  in  what- 
ever hands  one  will  —  Tom  Walker's,  or  Beldham's, 
or  Lord  Frederick  Beauclerk's,  or  even  Richard 
Nyren's  himself,  father  of  the  first  great  eulogist  of 
the  game.  Beside  it  is  another  veteran,  not  quite 
so  old,  though,  and  approaching  in  shape  the  bat  of 
our  own  day  —  such  a  bat  as  Lambert,  or  that  daunt- 
less sportsman,  Mr.  Osbaldiston  ("The  Squire,"  as  he 
was  known  in  the  hunting-field),  may  have  swung 
in  one  of  their  famous  single-wicket  contests. 

Beside  these  is  even  more  of  a  curiosity.  Nothing 
less  than  the  very  bat  which  during  his  brief  and 
not  too  glorious  cricket  career  was  employed  to 
defend  his  wicket,  if  not  actually  to  make  runs,  by 
the  late  King  Edward  VII  when  he  was  Prince  of 
Wales.  For  that  otherwise  accomplished  ruler  and 
full  man  (as  the  old  phrase  has  it)  was  never  much 
of  a  C.  B.  Fry.  He  knew  the  world  as  few  have 
known  it ;  he  commanded  respect  and  affection ;  he 
was  accustomed  to  give  orders  and  have  them 


My  Walks  Abroad 

instantly  obeyed ;  but  almost  anyone  could  bowl 
him  out,  and  it  is  on  record  that  those  royal  hands, 
so  capable  in  their  grasp  of  orb  and  sceptre,  had 
only  the  most  rudimentary  and  incomplete  idea  of 
retaining  a  catch.  Such  are  human  limitations ! 
Here,  however,  in  the  Cranbourn  Street  window,  is 
His  Majesty's  bat,  and  even  without  the  accom- 
panying label  one  would  guess  that  it  was  the 
property  of  no  very  efficient  cricketer.  For  it  lacks 
body ;  no  one  who  really  knew  would  have  borne  to 
the  pitch  a  blade  so  obviously  incapable  of  getting 
the  ball  to  the  ropes ;  while  just  beneath  the  too 
fanciful  splice  is  a  silver  plate.  Now  all  cricketers 
are  aware  that  it  is  when  the  incoming  man  carries 
a  bat  with  a  silver  plate  on  it  that  the  scorers  (if 
ever)  feel  entitled  to  dip  below  the  table  for  the 
bottle  and  glass  and  generally  relax  a  little. 

So  much  for  what  may  be  called  the  freaks  of  this 
fascinating  window.  Now  for  the  facts.  A  very 
striking  fact  indeed  is  the  splintered  bat  with  which 
Mr.  G.  L.  Jessop  made  a  trifle  of  168  against 
Lancashire.  I  wish  the  date  was  given ;  I  wish  even 
more  that  the  length  of  the  innings  in  minutes  was 
given.  Whether  the  splinters  were  lost  then,  or  later, 
we  should  also  be  told.  But  there  it  is,  and,  after  see- 
ing it,  how  to  get  through  these  infernal  months  of 
February  and  March  and  April  and  half  May,  until 
real  life  begins  again,  one  doesn't  know  and  can 
hardly  conjecture.  And  what  do  you  think  is  be- 
side it?  Nothing  less  than  "the  best  bat"  that  Mr, 
146 


"W.  G." 

M.  A.  Noble  ever  played  with  —  the  leisurely,  watchful 
Australian  master,  astute  captain,  inspired  change- 
howler,  and  the  steady,  remorseless  compiler  of 
scores  at  the  right  time.  It  is  something  to  have 
in  darkest  February  Noble's  best  bat  beneath  one's 
eyes. 

And  lastly,  there  is  a  scarred  and  discoloured 
blade  which  bears  the  brave  news  that  with  it  did 
that  old  man  hirsute,  now  on  great  match-days  a 
landmark  in  the  Lord's  pavilion,  surveying  the  turf 
where  once  he  ruled,—  "W.  G."  himself,  no  less, — 
make  over  a  thousand  runs.  Historic  wood,  if  you 
like ;  historic  window  ! 

No  wonder,  then,  that  I  scheme  to  get  Cranbourn 
Street  into  my  London  peregrinations.  For  here 
is  youth  renewed  and  the  dismallest  of  winters 
momentarily  slain. 


III.  —  ENTENTE 

Certain  London  streets  even  in  one's  own  district 
one  never  uses ;  and  eminent,  in  my  case,  among 
these  is  that  one,  to  me  nameless,  which  runs 
parallel  with  St.  Martin's  Lane,  a  little  to  the  east- 
ward. It  has  a  cheap  printer's  at  one  end,  opposite 
an  eye  hospital,  and  it  runs  away  into  small  shops 
and  model  dwellings. 

147 


My  Walks  Abroad 

Well,  I  chanced  to  be  there  the  other  night  taking 
a  short  cut  from  St.  Martin's  Lane  to  the  Strand, 
and  found  myself  in  a  little  crowd  surrounding  a 
large,  brilliantly  lighted  motor-car.  Why  the  crowd 
waited,  I  did  not  know  or  ask ;  it  was  enough  to 
make  one  of  them  and  wait  too,  for  that  is  life. 
And  then,  after  a  minute  or  so,  from  the  Coliseum 
stage-door,  which  I  observed  for  the  first  time, 
emerged  a  polite  foreign  gentleman  in  evening  dress 
followed  by  a  volatile  foreign  lady  with  a  mass  of 
dark  red  hair  and  strong,  animated  features.  The 
little  crowd  palpitated  and  cheered,  and  the  bolder 
ones  among  us  said,  "Bong  swaw,"  or  "Veev 
Sahrah." 

While  the  famous  lady  was  smiling  and  bowing 
and  waving  her  hand,  and  the  gentleman  was 
looking  self-effacing,  and  the  chauffeur  was  putting 
his  deadly  machinery  into  working  order,  I  walked 
on,  and  at  the  corner,  between  the  cheap  printer's 
and  the  eye  hospital,  stood  a  costermonger  with  a 
barrow  of  apples.  I  reached  him  just  at  the 
moment  when  the  motor-car,  illuminated  like 
an  excursion  steamer,  passed  Being  a  gallant 
creature  and  accustomed  to  the  time-table  of 
tragediennes,  he  barely  looked  up  from  the  sale  of 
two  Ribstons  as  he  called  out  in  a  hearty  London 
voice,  "Good  night,  Sarah!"  and  again  was  im- 
mersed in  trade.  "Sarah  Burnhard,"  he  explained 
to  his  perplexed  customer. 


148 


Major  Brooke 


IV.  —  THE  GOOD  MAJOR 

Every  now  and  then  one's  eyes  alight  upon  some- 
thing which  emphasizes  the  death  of  the  past  with 
disconcerting  vividness. 

Turning  recently  into  Shepherd's  Gallery  in  King 
Street  to  see  what  English  masters  had  been  assembled 
in  those  rooms  sacred  to  Gainsborough  and  Constable. 
Reynolds,  Romney,  Bonington,  and  the  other  great 
men  of  the  late  seventeen  hundreds  and  early 
eighteens,  I  was  immensely  tickled  by  a  mediocre 
canvas  belonging  to,  say,  1770.  It  depicted  an  elderly 
gentleman  of  benevolent  aspect,  in  a  wig,  knee- 
breeches,  and  white  silk  stockings,  seated  at  a  table 
with  an  open  book  in  his  hand.  Behind  and  about 
him  were  spinning-wheels,  bundles  of  flax,  and  so 
forth,  and  before  him  three  small  children  —  the  first 
a  boy  on  his  knees  in  an  attitude  of  prayer,  the 
second  a  girl  in  a  neat  mob-cap,  standing,  and  lastly 
a  very  minute  person  indeed  hiding  behind  the  girl. 
Judged  as  a  work  of  art,  the  picture  had  no  merits 
whatever;  it  was  merely  a  painted  record.  But  as 
a  human  document  it  was  priceless,  while  as  a 
reminder  of  the  flight  of  time  and  change  of  fashions 
it  could  not  well  be  more  striking ;  for  how  do 
you  think  the  title  of  it  ran  —  painted  boldly  on 
a  wooden  label  fixed  to  the  top  of  the  frame?  It 
ran  thus:  "Major  Brooke  instructing  the  Children 
of  the  Sunday  School  and  School  of  Industry 
149 


My  Walks  Abroad 

in    Bath    in    the    First    Principles    of    the    Christian 
Religion." 

Impossible  to  conceive  of  such  a  picture  being 
painted  to-day.  Not  that  we  have  not  equally  bad 
artists  or  equally  good  majors ;  but  our  bad  artists 
choose  other  subjects,  and  our  good  majors  leave  the 
inculcation  of  the  First  Principles  of  the  Christian 
Religion  into  other  people's  children  to  other  people. 
Nor  are  they  any  longer  quite  so  confident  as  to 
what  the  First  Principles  of  the  Christian  Religion 
are.  But  Major  Brooke  —  amiable  dodo  !  —  he  had 
no  doubts. 


V.  —  THE  ROGUES 

Artists  in  fraud  are  always  with  us,  but  it  is  un- 
usual to  meet  with  three  good  examples  in  one 
week.  Yet  I  have  just  done  so.  I  had  drifted  into 
a  billiard  saloon  in  the  West  Central  district,  where 
there  are  many  tables,  including  French  ones  with- 
out pockets,  and  I  noticed  two  men  playing.  Their 
game  was  indifferent,  but  they  themselves  were  so 
difficult  to  place  that  I  was  interested.  Not  book- 
makers and  not  dealers  of  any  kind,  but  a  type, 
distinctly  Hebraic,  between  those  callings.  They 
were  carefully  dressed,  but  very  common,  and  they 
had  both  time  and  money,  for  here  they  were  idling 
as  early  as  half-past  four. 


The  Auction 

They  left  before  I  did ;  and  passing  out  soon  after- 
wards into  a  busy  street  I  found  myself  looking  into 
one  of  those  shops  from  which  the  windows  and 
door  have  been  removed  in  order  that  sales  by 
auction  may  be  the  more  easily  carried  on  in  them. 
The  auctioneer  was  shouting  in  the  rostrum,  and 
behold  he  was  one  of  the  billiard  players  !  Pictures, 
busts,  watches,  jewellery  and  ornaments  were  the 
stock,  and  a  gaudy  pair  of  vases  was  being  put  up. 
There  was  hesitation  in  bidding,  and  at  last  a  voice 
offered  five  shillings.  After  a  few  languid  bids  the 
vases  were  knocked  down  to  this  speculator,  whom 
I  could  not  see,  for  a  pound. 

"Some  people  think  these  sales  are  not  genuine," 
the  auctioneer  said,  "but  I  give  you  my  word  they 
are.  Some  say  that  these  bids  are  made  by  our 
own  friends,  just  to  encourage  the  others ;  but  it  is 
untrue.  You,  sir,"  he  added,  turning  to  the  success- 
ful bidder,  "you  have  never  seen  me  before,  have 
you?" 

We  all  looked  toward  the  gentleman  in  question, 
and  a  displacement  of  heads  permitted  me  to  see 
him  clearly. 

"You've  never  seen  me  before,  have  you,  sir?" 
the  auctioneer  inquired  again. 

"Never,"  said  the  man. 

It  was  the  other  player  in  the  game  of  billiards. 

That  was  on  a  Thursday.  The  next  day  I  met 
by  chance  an  old  acquaintance,  in  whose  curiosity- 
shop  in  the  seaside  town  that  I  was  now  visiting 


again  I  had,  twenty  and  more  years  ago,  spent  far 
too  much  time,  drawn  thither  partly  by  a  natural 
leaning  towards  pictures  and  books  and  pottery  and 
all  the  other  odds  and  ends  which  come  from  every 
corner  of  the  earth  and  all  ages  to  make  up  the 
stock-in-trade  of  such  places,  but  more  by  the 
personality  of  the  dealer.  Nominally  he  was  a 
goldsmith  and  jeweller,  as  every  great  artist  in  Italy 
used  to  be,  but  actually  he  was  an  amusing  loafer. 
He  sat  at  a  little  vice,  with  a  file  in  his  hand,  and 
did  nothing  but  talk.  He  passed  his  fingers  through 
his  bushy  iron-grey  locks,  glanced  at  the  reflection 
of  his  bright  eyes  and  ruddy  cheeks  in  the  mirror  — 
there  was  always  a  mirror  —  and  talked.  His  pet 
illusion  was  that  he  was  Byronic.  He  had  for  re- 
vealed religion  a  scorn  which  he  thought  Byronic, 
although  it  was  really  of  the  brand  of  Foote  and 
Taxil ;  he  had  for  the  moral  code  a  contempt  which 
he  thought  Byronic,  although  it  was  merely  the 
most  ordinary  self-indulgence.  But  Byron  having 
been  loose  in  such  matters,  he  was  looser  with  a 
greater  courage.  He  had  a  mischievous,  sardonic 
view  of  the  world  which  he  thought  was  Byronic, 
but  which  was  quite  genuine  and  belonged  to  his 
nature.  Notlu'ng  gave  him  so  much  pleasure  as  to 
watch  the  swindlers  of  his  secondary  profession  at 
work.  We  used  to  discuss  poetry  and  painting,  but 
above  all  the  riddle  of  life,  and  on  his  part  always 
destructively.  It  was  a  very  school  for  cynicism, 
this  little  shop,  where  nothing,  so  far  as  I  knew,  was 
152 


An  Old  Friend 

ever  sold  and  I  was  the  only  habitue.  He  had  an 
adopted  niece,  aged  about  seven  —  a  pert,  pretty 
little  creature  whom  he  spoiled  utterly;  he  had  a 
complaining  wife  who  had  no  patience  with  his 
treatment  of  his  niece,  his  Byronic  airs,  his  verbose 
sloth  or  his  prevailing  gaiety,  and  affected  none. 
He  also  had  a  retinue  of  complacent  servant-girls 
whom  his  tropes  and  flashy  theories  delighted. 

Such  was  my  Byronic  friend  in  1887  to  about 
1890 ;  and  I  must  confess  not  often  to  have  thought 
of  him  since;  and  then  last  week,  on  this  flying 
visit  to  my  old  town,  I  saw  him  again.  He  was 
bending  over  a  portfolio,  but  I  knew  his  back  at 
once.  His  hair  had  become  white  and  a  little 
thinner ;  but  everything  else  was  the  same :  the 
ruddy  cheek,  the  sparkling  eye,  always  lighting  up 
at  the  originality  of  some  world-old  denial  or  affirma- 
tion, the  Byronic  open  collar,  the  Byronic  necktie. 
He  did  not  recognize  me  at  first ;  but  instantly 
afterwards  we  resumed  the  intercourse  of  twenty 
years  before ;  although  now  it  was  I  who  was  the 
older,  not  he.  With  him  time  had  stood  still.  The 
only  change  in  his  talk  was  a  tinge  of  embitterment, 
not  that  he  had  failed  financially,  but  that  his  friends 
had  left  him.  The  complaining  wife  was  dead,  nor 
did  his  references  to  her  dim  his  brilliant  orbs ;  but 
his  adopted  niece  —  it  was  her  .and  her  husband's 
hostility  to  himself  that  he  found  such  a  pill.  The 
old  burden,  "After  all  I  had  done,  too,"  rolled  out 
once  more,  that  phrase  which  summarizes  so  much 

153 


My  Walks  Abroad 

of   man's   dealings   with   man   and   perhaps   more   of 
woman's  dealing  with  woman. 

He  soon  checked  himself,  however,  remembering 
my  ancient  tastes,  and  clutched  my  arm.  "What  a 
world!"  he  chuckled,—  "what  a  world!  I'll  show 
you  something  —  something  to  interest  you.  It's 
not  far,"  and  he  pulled  me  along  to  the  window  of 
an  old  picture-shop.  "Hush,"  he  said,  "be  careful: 
walls  have  ears ;  but  just  look  at  that  painting  there, 
that  portrait.  What  do  you  make  of  that  ?" 

It  was  a  woman's  face,  obviously  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, of  the  period,  say,  of  Ramsay  and  Reynolds.  She 
glimmered  at  us  through  layers  of  grime  and  blister. 
"When  do  you  think  that  was  painted  ?"  he  asked. 

"Oh,  I  don't  know,"  I  said.     "1780  perhaps." 

He  doubled  himself  up  with  wicked  joy.  "What 
a  world  !"  he  exclaimed.  "  Three  weeks  ago  !  What 
a  world  !" 

"Nonsense  !"  I  replied. 

"Truth,"  he  said.     "I  know  the  painter." 

He  again  pulled  my  sleeve  and  we  retired  to  a 
passage.  He  looked  fearfully  round  and  drew  from 
his  pocket  a  creased  page  of  a  magazine.  It  was  an 
art  magazine  of  recent  date,  and  the  plate  repre- 
sented another  eighteenth-century  lady.  Underneath 
was  printed  "Newly  discovered  Romney." 

He  leaned  against  the  wall  and  squirmed.  "Same 
man,"  he  gurgled  at  last.  "Same  man.  I  watched 
him  paint  it.  What  a  world  !  Lord,  I  don't  want 
to  die  yet ! " 

154 


A  "Fun  City" 


VI.  —  THE  PRINCESS  AND  MEN 

I  was  in  Oxford  Street,  drifting  slowly  towards  an 
appointment,  when  the  dismal  words  "Fun  City," 
in  large  letters,  caught  the  eye  over  some  derelict 
premises.  Oxford  Street  is  ordinarily  so  consistently 
businesslike  and  in  earnest  that  I  thought  I  might 
as  well  examine  this  frivolous  stock-in-trade  as  any 
other,  even  though  long  experience  has  taught  me 
how  little  the  promise  contains ;  and  in  I  went. 
You  know  what  "Fun  Cities"  are:  penny-in-the- 
slot  machines,  living  photographs,  fortune-tellers, 
football  matches,  try-your-strengths,  and  gramo- 
phones ;  ninepins,  ring-throwing,  cocoanuts,  sweet 
stalls ;  with  a  few  more  elaborate  side-shows,  all  at 
a  penny,  those  in  this  particidar  one  comprising  a 
forlorn  negro  champion  disarrayed  for  boxing  a  lean 
and  dispirited  white  champion  ;  a  company  of  dwarfs ; 
a  palmist ;  and  a  troupe  of  wrestlers.  All  were  to 
perform  for  a  penny  behind  their  grimy  curtains, 
and  iron  throats  were  shouting  the  glad  news. 

I  was  coming  out  in  a  state  of  dismay  induced 
by  so  much  noise  and  negligibleness  when  another 
metal  larynx  urged  upon  me  the  duty  of  seeing 
"the  most  beautiful  girl  on  earth,"  who  was  not 
only  that  rare  thing,  but  also  "a  picture  gallery  in 
herself"  —  the  Princess  Cristina,  in  short  —  and,  look- 
ing up,  I  saw  a  poster  of  a  tattooed  lady,  fortified  by 
photographs  which  brought  in  the  evidence  of  the 
155 


My  Walks  Abroad 

truthful  camera  and  suggested  that,  for  once,  the 
poster  artist  had  not  gone  much  farther  than  fact. 
This  was  an  interesting  discovery ;  but  there  was 
something  in  these  pictures  of  the  tattooed  lady's 
face,  apart  (I  swear)  from  her  eventful  epidermis, 
which  made  its  appeal  —  a  touch  of  wistf ulness  and 
not  a  little  grace  —  and,  the  entrance  fee  being  within 
my  means,  I  paid  it,  and  found  myself  among  a 
dozen  men,  who  had,  of  course,  been  urged  thither 
by  precisely  similar  motives. 

The  Princess  herself  was  on  the  platform,  shiver- 
ing under  an  overcoat,  waiting  to  begin,  which  she 
could  not  do  until  the  metal  larynx  was  mercifully 
mute.  She  stood  motionless,  looking  at  nothing, 
and  the  camera  had  not  lied.  Or,  if  it  had,  it  was 
on  the  other  side,  for  she  was  more  attractive  than 
it  stated.  Her  features  were  delicate  and  regular; 
her  mouth  noticeably  well  cut,  although  her  lips 
were  perhaps  a  shade  too  thin ;  her  eyes  were  at 
once  candid  and  melancholy.  The  larynx  stopping, 
she  got  to  work  instantly ;  stripped  off  her  overcoat, 
revealing  bare  chest  and  arms,  very  shapely ;  and, 
in  a  Cockney  accent  with  a  transatlantic  hint,  began 
her  speech  of  introduction. 

Her  shoulders,  arms,  and  what  could  be  seen  of 
her  bosom  were  wholly  covered  with  those  blue-and- 
red  designs  that  appeal  to  tattooers  and  tattooed 
and  to  no  one  else ;  dragons,  ships,  intertwined 
flags,  true  love  knots,  daggers,  snakes,  Buffalo  Bill's 
head.  These,  one  by  one,  she  pointed  to  and  ex- 
156 


The  Tattooed  Lady 

plained,  with  a  mirthless  humour  and  that  want 
both  of  real  shame  and  false  shame  which  can  so 
astonish  and  abash  the  onlooker,  calling  us  impar- 
tially "boys"  the  while,  and  never  looking  at  any- 
one individually.  The  glories  of  the  upper  regions 
having  been  exhibited,  "Now,  boys,"  she  said,  "I'm 
going  to  give  you  a  treat,"  and  proceeded  to  disclose 
her  legs,  which  turned  out  to  have  practically  the 
same  patterns  as  the  rest  of  her. 

But  it  was  not  the  tattooing  that  was  interesting ; 
it  was  herself.  She  was  so  utterly  a  machine  —  so 
detached  and  disinterested,  and,  as  I  say,  mirthless, 
her  wistful,  sophisticated  eyes  never  lighting  to  her 
tongue,  and  never  caring  to  investigate  a  single 
spectator's  face.  Years  of  public  exhibition,  to- 
gether with  the  facetious  or  familiar  comments  of 
certain  units  of  the  many  knots  before  her,  had 
done  their  work,  and  men  to  her  were  men  in  a 
special  sense  of  the  word.  I  will  not  say  enemies, 
but  necessary  evils :  foolish,  inquisitive  creatures 
who  had  got  to  be  kept  their  distance,  and,  while 
entertained,  repelled.  Watching  her,  one  had  the 
feeling  that  she  was  by  far  the  best  thing  there. 
Watching  here,  high  on  her  little  platform,  above  us 
all,  unique  in  the  possession  of  these  trumpery  indigo 
markings  (no  doubt  inflicted  upon  her  early  in  youth 
by  foresighted  parents),  the  promise  of  displaying 
which  had  brought  day  after  day,  year  after  year,  in 
the  New  World  equally  with  the  Old  (for  the  tattooer 
obviously  had  worked  with  a  cosmopolitan  eye), 

157 


My  Walks  Abroad 

these  curious  little  crowds  of  which  I  now  made  one, 
I  realized  suddenly  what  the  prevailing  expression 
on  those  refined  features  was.  It  was  contempt. 
The  Princess  had  summed  us  up ;  she  knew  men 
through  and  through ;  and  if  there  were  any  excep- 
tions (which  was  unlikely),  was  too  clever  to  admit 
it.  For  the  really  clever  people  never  admit  ex- 
ceptions :  they  generalize  and  succeed. 

Any  doubt  there  might  be  on  this  score  disap- 
peared later;  for  she  produced  a  bundle  of  sealed 
envelopes,  which,  from  the  nature  of  their  contents, 
might  not,  she  said,  be  sold  to  ladies,  and  must  not 
be  opened  inside  the  building ;  and  these  she  offered 
at  a  penny  each  with  a  portrait  of  herself  thrown  in. 
We  all  paid  our  pennies  and  filed  out,  eager,  as  the 
pretty,  tired,  and  very  chilly  Princess  knew,  to  dis- 
cover as  quickly  as  possible,  unobserved  by  each 
other,  what  we  had  got.  .  .  . 

My  envelope  contained  a  piece  of  paper  bearing 
these  words :  "  Great  respect  from  everybody  do 
persons  get  that  are  born  on  this  day;  they  are 
open-minded,  intelligent,  and  thoughtful,  make  good 
friends  and  partners,  are  very  loving  to  the  opposite 
sex." 


VII.  —  THE  HoFfiRAUHAua 

"Do    you    never    look    at    anything    but    pictures 
when    you    go    abroad?"    I    was    once    asked.     The 
158 


The  Hofbrauhaus 

question  no  doubt  I  brought  on  myself ;  and  yet 
there  ought,  by  this  time,  to  be  a  certain  weight  of 
evidence  in  the  other  direction.  At  Munich,  for 
example,  one  refreshes  oneself  for  the  next  day's 
visit  to  the  Pinakothek  by  sitting  quietly  at  a  place 
of  entertainment  watching  the  living  Bavarian  at  his 
pleasures.  The  good  Karl  Baedeker  makes  you.  On 
no  account,  he  says,  should  one  miss  the  Hofbrauhaus ; 
and  although  it  is  permissible  to  look  upon  some  of 
his  instructions  as  counsels  of  perfection,  this  at  any 
rate  I  obeyed.  The  only  difficulty  about  the  Hof- 
brauhaus is  finding  it,  for  it  is  hidden  away  on  the 
Platen,  a  street  in  Munich  which  leads  nowhere  and 
to  which,  in  spite  of  the  presence  of  this  palace  of 
conviviality,  no  other  street  seems  to  lead,  except  by 
accident.  In  fact,  it  is  quite  easy  to  overlook  the 
Hofbrauhaus  altogether,  and  to  leave  Munich,  after 
weeks  of  toilsome  adventure,  under  the  impression 
that  one  has  seen  all,  totally  unconscious  that  all 
the  time  some  half  the  population  of  that  city,  day 
and  night,  have  been  comfortably  seated  within  the 
Hofbrauhaus  walls,  not  only  hidden  thereby  from 
one's  gaze,  but  concealed  even  more  completely  in 
other  ways,  their  bodies  being  invisible  in  smoke 
and  their  faces  submerged  in  their  mugs. 

I  have  great  difficulty  in  describing  this  resort, 
because  we  have  nothing  like  it.  But  I  can  do 
something.  Think  of  the  largest  building  you  were 
ever  in.  Then  double  it.  Give  it  three  floors,  and 
fill  it  with  tobacco  smoke.  Now  you  have  a  rough 

159 


My  Walks  Abroad 

notion  of  the  Hofbrauhaus.  It  is  as  though  one 
entered  the  Hotel  Cecil  (shall  I  say?),  and  on  open- 
ing the  door  found  oneself  peering  into  the  dark 
recesses  of  a  hall  measureless  to  man,  in  which  sat 
thousands  of  artisans  drinking  beer ;  and  then 
climbed  a  staircase  and  found  smaller  rooms  filled  in 
the  same  way ;  and  then  climbed  again  and  opened 
another  door  and  found  another  room  like  the  first, 
only  higher  and  brighter,  where  the  middle  classes, 
also  in  their  thousands,  or  even  possibly  millions,  sat 
smoking  and  chattering  and  drinking  beer  and  then 
more  beer. 

If  that  flight  of  fancy  does  not  help  you  to 
visualize  the  Hofbrauhaus,  I  would  add  the  counsel 
to  imagine  one  of  Ostade's  tavern  scenes  modern- 
ized as  to  costume  and  multiplied  to  infinity.  One 
difference,  however,  between  the  old  roisterer  and 
the  new  is  that  the  old  roisterer  seems  to  have  got 
very  drunk,  and  to  have  preferred  an  inverted  barrel 
for  his  table,  whereas  the  new  roisterer,  as  he  is  to 
be  observed  at  the  Hofbrauhaus,  sits  in  tightly 
jammed  rows  at  long  tables,  as  though  he  were  a 
director,  and  sends  pint  after  pint  pursuing  each 
other  through  his  astounding  system,  with  his 
daughter  on  one  side  of  him,  and  his  wife  on  the 
other,  and  his  old  mother,  maybe,  opposite. 

For  it  is  a  family  resort,  this  Hofbrauhaus ;    it  is 

both  hearth  and  club  and  mahogany  tree.     It  is  also 

a   concert-room ;     for   on   one   of   the   nights   that   I 

visited   it   I    had    to   pay    threepence   admission,   in 

1 60 


Munich  at  Ease 

order  to  make  one  of  the  millions  who  listened  in 
rapture  and  perfect  silence  to  the  strains  of  a  violin 
which  emerged  ravishingly  from  the  smoky  pro- 
found. In  the  intervals  of  the  music  I  set  out  to 
count  the  mugs  which  my  neighbours  were  empty- 
ing, but  the  task  was  too  great,  and  I  turned  rather 
to  the  consideration  of  the  differences  between  the 
Miinchener  and  the  Londoner,  which  make  it  possible 
for  the  one  to  spend  his  evenings  quietly,  if  extrava- 
gantly, thus,  with  his  family  about  him,  and  a  bound- 
less thirst  blessing  the  board  and  never  disgracing 
it  (for  I  saw  none  drunk  in  this  city),  while  the 
other,  the  Londoner,  in  a  similar  position,  leaving 
his  wife  and  children  in  their  home,  must  roam  from 
bar  to  bar,  fuddling  his  brains,  and  hearing  nothing 
but  gramophones  or  mechanical  pianos  whose  keys 
are  depressed  by  no  earthly  fingers. 

Another .  difference  between  this  temple  of  Gam- 
brinus  and  our  own  drinking-places  is  that  the 
Hofbrauhaus  has  one  tap  only  —  the  Hofbrau.  If 
you  do  not  like  it,  you  stay  away ;  if  you  do  like  it, 
you  consume  it  inordinately.  It  is  brought  by  quick 
little  women,  far  liker  old  and  trusted  domestic 
servants  than  the  barmaids  of  Albion.  Long  may 
they  flourish,  these  efficient  and  active  Hebes ! 
Long  may  they  make  it  an  easy  thing  for  forty 
thousand  Bavarians  to  drink  as  one ! 


161 


Unlikely  Conversations          <^y          ^y         ^y 

I. — THE  NEW  GAOL 

THE    Governor  received    me  with    that   dignified 
courtesy  which  has  ever  gone  with  the  control 
of  such  institutions.     "I  think,"   he  said,   "you  will 
agree  that  it  is  well  conducted." 

He  took  a  huge  bunch  of  keys  from  its  nail  and 
led  the  way. 

"Here,"  he  said,  unlocking  a  cell,  "is  »a  very  old 
offender." 

I  peered  into  the  gloom  and  saw  an  Aberdeen 
terrier  in  the  corner.  Naughtiness  was  written  all 
over  him. 

"Sandy's  his  name,"  said  the  Governor.  "A 
destructive  maniac.  He  tears  up  everything  he 
sees  —  clothes,  papers,  work-bags,  carpets,  hearth- 
rugs, even  books.  His  last  offence  was  to  chew  a 
presentation  copy  of  Bryce's  American  Constitution. 
He  is  here  for  a  week.  We  cover  articles  with  eau- 
de-Cologne,  whisky,  and  tobacco- juice  to  disgust  him." 

In  the  next  cell  was  a  bulldog. 
162 


The  Bad  Dogs 

"Disobedience,"  said  the  Governor.  "Won't  go 
out  for  walks  without  a  lead,  and  then  pulls  at  it 
like  a  salmon.  We  fasten  him  to  a  crank,  and  he 
has  to  trot  with  it  or  be  half  choked  for  hours." 

In  the  next  was  a  little  black  spaniel. 

"Refuses  to  be  broken  to  the  house,"  said  the 
Governor.  "A  stubborn  case.  Otherwise  a  charm- 
ing character.  Systematic  lashings  regularly  was 
the  sentence." 

"Do  you  find  that  punishment  is  a  deterrent?" 
I  asked. 

"Undoubtedly,"  he  said;  "but  they  learn  slowly. 
One  sojourn  here  is  rarely  enough.  Here,  for 
example,  is  a  frequent  visitor,"  and  he  showed  me 
an  Irish  terrier.  "A  cat-worrier.  We  deal  with 
him  by  pushing  stuffed  cats  charged  with  electricity 
into  his  cell.  In  the  way  they  cure  crib-biters,  you 
know.  But  his  spirit  is  stronger  than  his  sense  of 
pain." 

"Good  dog  ?"  I  involuntarily  said. 

The  Governor  was  scandalized,  and  led  me  away. 
"Had  I  known  you  would  so  forget  yourself,"  he 
said,  "I  should  have  refused  you  the  interview." 


II.  —  PUCK   SUPERSEDED 

He  was  in  the  opposite  corner  to   me  and  for  a 
while  he  read  his  paper.     Then  he  looked  out  of  the 

163 


Unlikely  Conversations 

window,  and  then  he  began  a  furtive  examination  of 
myself  and  my  belongings  in  that  offensive  way 
which  one's  fellow-passengers  so  often  and  so  irrita- 
tingly  employ.  At  last,  after  many  false  starts,  he 
spoke  to  me. 

"You  rarely  travel  abroad?"  he  said  inquiringly. 

"Very  rarely,"  I  replied.  "But  what  makes  you 
think  so  ?" 

"Your  bag,"  he  said.  "It  has  no  foreign  labels 
on  it." 

I  perhaps  showed  surprise  at  his  acumen,  for  he 
continued,  very  knowingly,  in  a  half-whisper,  leaning 
towards  me,  "But  the  converse  isn't  always  true,  you 
know." 

"What  do  you  mean  ?"  I  asked. 

"Why,  it  doesn't  necessarily  follow  that  because 
a  bag  is  covered  with  foreign  labels  its  owner  has 
travelled  abroad.  For  instance,"  he  added,  with  a 
cunning  look,  drawing  from  his  pocket  an  envelope, 
"I  could  furnish  you  with  a  complete  Swiss  and 
Italian  route  in  two  minutes,  if  you'd  allow  me;" 
and  he  spread  before  me  a  series  of  hotel  labels 
ranging  from  Lucerne  to  Rome. 

"So  you  mean  that  you  deal  in  these  things?"  I 
asked  in  astonishment. 

"I  do  indeed,"  he  said.  "My  business  is  to  turn 
the  untravelled  into  travellers.  There  are  lots  of 
gentlemen  who  spend  their  holidays  very  quietly  at 
home,  after  giving  it  out  that  they  are  going,  say,  to 
Nuremberg.  Well,  for  half  a  crown  I  provide  them 
164 


The  Label  Merchant 

with  a  good  Nuremberg  hotel  label,  and  no  one  is 
the  wiser  —  unless,  of  course,  they  are  cross-examined 
too  severely  by  one  who  knows  that  city.  Young 
couples  in  the  suburbs  are  very  good  customers  of 
mine.  There  is  a  lot  of  rivalry  in  the  suburbs  about 
holidays,  you  may  have  noticed.  Every  one  wants  to 
appear  a  little  more  expensive  and  venturesome  than 
every  one  else ;  but  they  haven't  really  got  the  money 
for  it,  poor  things,  so  they  come  to  me,  and  I  plaster 
circumstantial  evidence  of  Innsbruck  or  Interlaken 
or  Venice  or  Bergen  all  over  their  trunks ;  and  they 
return  from  Rustington,  or  Hythe,  or  wherever  it  is, 
certain  of  a  successful  winter.  They  work  entirely 
for  their  neighbours,  do  the  young  couples ;  but 
there  are  lots  of  gentlemen  who  work  merely  for 
fellow-passengers  in  railway  carriages  and  on  plat- 
forms. It's  them  they  want  to  impress.  Human 
nature's  very  rum.  It  is  through  observing  it  that 
I  came  to  take  up  this  business. 

"Then  there's  another  customer,  who  really  does 
travel,  but  not  in  the  style  that  he  wants  people  to 
believe.  In  reality,  when,  for  example,  he  stays  at 
Lucerne,  he  puts  up  at  some  little  cheap  place 
without  a  name ;  but  he  gets  from  me  a  Schweizerhof 
label  and  sticks  that  on  in  the  train.  You  see?" 

I  asked  him  how  much  he  charged. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "prices  vary.  In  August,  Scotch 
hotel  labels  are  dearer  than  in  July,  of  course, 
especially  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  best  moors. 
A  Swiss  set  of  eight  I  can  do  for  a  pound  —  half  a 

165 


Unlikely  Conversations 

crown  apiece.  The  Italian  set  is  dearer,  and  so  on. 
When  it  comes  to  Russia  and  Greece,  dearer  still. 
India  works  out  at  about  half  a  sovereign  a  label ; 
but  the  big-game  districts  of  Africa  are  really  costly 
— •  ten  pounds  a  label  sometimes.  There's  not  much 
demand  for  American  labels,  but  Japans  are  a  steady 
market.  I've  got  a  Japanese  set  here  for  a  gentle- 
man who  pretends  he's  there  now  —  a  dramatic  critic, 
I  believe  he  is  —  but  he's  really  hiding  in  Hertford- 
shire all  the  time.  He's  due  back  soon,  and  he 
wants  the  labels  to  look  well  seasoned,  and  so  we're 
sticking  them  on  to-day." 

"But  surely  your  clients  must  get  caught  out  now 
and  then  ?"  I  said. 

"Not  if  they're  careful,"  he  replied.  "You  see, 
I'm  always  at  hand  to  help  them.  I  deal  in  picture- 
postcards  of  foreign  parts  as  well  as  labels,  and  then 
there's  guide-books,  you  know.  No,  if  they  get 
caught  out  it's  their  own  fault." 

The  train  pulling  up  at  King's  Langley,  he  care- 
fully collected  his  stock  of  labels,  bade  me  good-day, 
and  got  out. 


III.  —  THE  SECRET  OUT 

For  years  and  years  it  has  been  a  mystery  to  me, 
and  I  have  no  doubt  to  others,  where  the  Post  Offices 
get  their  pencils  —  those  pencils   which  are  of  such 
1 66 


Post-Office  Service 

value  that  they  are  chained  to  the  telegraph  counter 
like  the  nail-brushes  at  a  political  club  not  a  hundred 
miles  from  Northumberland  Avenue. 

From  what  mines  can  such  plumbago  be  excavated 
—  plumbago  warranted  to  make  no  mark  save  by 
intense  pressure,  and  when  intensely  pressed  to 
break  ?  I  have  bought  pencils  at  every  price  in 
retail  shops,  but  never  have  I  found  anything  like 
these.  They  are,  as  the  dealer  said,  "a  unique." 

But  now  I  know  the  secret,  for  I  have  met  a 
public  official  who  gave  it  away. 

"Yes,"  he  said,  "I  am  a  specialist  in  the  im- 
practicable, and  as  such  am  adviser  to  Government 
departments  and  railway  companies.  You  have 
heard,  of  course,  of  the  'Corridor  Soap'  used  on 
certain  lines,  the  great  merit  of  which  is  that  it 
'won't  wash  hands'?  Well,  I  discovered  that  soap. 
It  took  me  a  long  time,  but  I  found  it  at  last.  I 
was  paid  a  handsome  commission  by  several  leading 
companies  for  putting  them  up  to  it." 

"Indeed  ?"  said  I. 

"Yes,"  he  continued,  "and  it  was  I  who  brought 
to  perfection  the  post-office  pencil.  The  post-office 
nib  is  mine  too,  made  to  my  pattern  by  a  well-known 
firm.  Have  you  noticed  the  post-office  blotting- 
paper  ?  " 

"I  have,"  I  said,  with  a  groan. 

"Ah!"  he  resumed,  his  eye  gleaming,  "that  was 
a  great  find.  That  comes  from  France." 

"From  France  ?" 

167 


Unlikely  Conversations 

"Yes,  from  France.  They  understand  bad  blot- 
ting-paper there.  And  the  post-office  ink,"  he 
continued,  "you  might  think  that  became  thick  in 
course  of  time ;  but  it  doesn't.  Let  me  tell  you 
a  secret,"  and  he  whispered  in  my  ear.  "It  begins 
like  that !  It's  a  kind  of  stirabout  from  the  word 
go!" 

"No  !"  I  cried. 

"I  swear  it,"  he  said. 


IV.  —  THE  SCHOOL  FOR  WAITERS 

"We  teach  them,"  he  said,  "everything  here. 
We  guarantee  to  turn  them  out  qualified  to  do 
credit  to  the  waiter's  calling.  For  example,  to  show 
you  how  thorough  we  are,  here  is  our  exercise-ground. 
That's  where  we  teach  them  to  walk.  See,  they're 
at  it  now.  Not  too  fast,  you  notice,  and  not  too 
springy.  In  fact,  springiness  is  one  of  our  betes  n&ires, 
if  I  may  so  express  myself.  We  have  an  instrument 
for  rendering  the  feet  flat  in  those  cases  where 
Nature  hasn't  done  it.  But  she  usually  does.  A 
wonderful  woman  Nature,  sir. 

"This  room  here  is  where  the  waiters'  vocabulary 
is  taught.  It's  a  brief  one,  but  of  the  highest  im- 
portance. The  chief  work  is  to  make  them  unlearn 
what  they  know.  Many  of  our  candidates  come 
168 


The  Compleat  Waiter 

here  with  quite  a  flow  of  language.  Epithets  for 
everything.  But  we  don't  allow  that,  of  course. 
There's  only  one  adjective  for  food,  and  that's 
'nice/  and  no  man  gets  our  certificate  until  he 
has  ceased  to  use  all  the  others.  You  may  have 
noticed  that  no  good  waiter  ever  uses  any  other 
word  —  'Have  a  nice  grilled  sole?'  he  says;  'a  nice 
cutlet';  'a  nice  chop';  'a  nice  steak?'  That's  so, 
isn't  it  ?  All  our  doing. 

"There  are  other  phrases,  too;  but  very  few  of 
them.  We  don't  want  to  burden  the  men's  minds. 
'Coming,  sir,  coming,'  —  they  have  to  practise  that 
for  hours.  And  then  the  stock  reply  to  impatient 
customers,  'In  two  minutes,'  —  they  practise  that 
too.  Some  of  them  are  very  quick  and  get  the 
whole  vocabulary  in  a  month  or  so  quite  perfectly 
Others  take  longer. 

"In  this  room,"  added  my  cicerone,  "we  teach 
them  also  to  say  quietly  but  effectively,  after  City 
dinners  and  other  big  gatherings,  'I'm  just  going 
now,  sir,'  'I  hope  everything  has  been  satisfactory, 
sir,'  and  such  stimulating  phrases. 

"Here's  the  cellar.  This  is  where  we  train  the 
men  in  shaking  bottles.  You  see  that  young  fellow 
there  —  he  has  naturally  quite  a  steady  hand,  but 
give  him  a  bottle  of  old  claret  or  hock  and  it'll  be 
like  a  thick  soup  when  he  comes  to  pour  it  out. 
He's  our  best  pupil,  but  the  others  become  good 
before  we've  done  with  them.  There's  also  a  special 
class  for  pouring  out  wine  so  as  to  spill  a  little  We 
169 


Unlikely  Conversations 

are  very  particular  about  that ;  and  coffee  too.  We 
spend  the  utmost  pains  in  teaching  artistic  coffee- 
spilling.  Some  gentlemen  wouldn't  know  where  they 
were  if  the  waiters  poured  coffee  neatly,  so  we  have 
to  be  particular. 

"This  is  the  auditorium,  as  we  call  it,  where  we 
coach  the  men  in  not  hearing  customers  the  first 
time.  And  I  think  that's  all." 

I  thanked  him  for  his  courtesy,  and  before  leaving 
asked  for  the  name  of  the  restaurant  to  which  his 
men  usually  went,  to  keep  it  as  a  reference. 

"None  in  particular,"  he  said ;  "they  go  to  all." 


V.  —  THE  PUBLIC'S  PRIVILEGE 

"Please  send  the  manager  to  me,"  I  said. 

The  manager  came,  with  the  usual  expression  of 
surprised  innocence  and  self-protectiveness. 

"No,  there's  nothing  wrong,"  I  said.  "I  merely 
wanted  to  talk  a  little." 

He  inclined  his  head. 

"Why,"  I  said,  drawing  his  attention  to  the 
menu,  "why  this  large  type  for  the  NEW  of  peas? 
It  is  now  mid- July.  Would  not  'peas'  be  enough? 
No  one  takes  them  out  of  a  bottle  now,  surely  ?" 

He  shrugged  his  shoulders.  "Our  customers 
expect  it,"  he  said. 

170 


The  True  Explanation 

"It  excites  them,  I  suppose,"  I  said,  "and  thus 
prepares  them  to  pay  the  price  asked  —  a  shilling. 
But  why  a  shilling?"  I  continued.  "Why  ask  a 
shilling  for  a  pennyworth  of  peas  ?  You  ask  only 
a  penny  for  bread  and  a  penny  for  butter,  and  they 
have  to  be  manufactured.  Peas  grow." 

He  shrugged  his  shoulders  again.  "Peas  are  a 
luxury,"  he  said. 

"Very  well,"  I  continued,  "I  will  grant  that. 
The  profit  is  no  doubt  just  —  from  your  point  of 
view.  But  look  here,"  and  I  showed  him  the 
morning  paper,  with  an  account  of  the  glut  of  straw- 
berries in  London  —  tons  and  tons  going  begging  in 
Co  vent  Garden  —  2d.  a  pound  in  the  streets.  "  And 
now  look  at  this,"  I  added,  and  showed  him  in 
large  type  in  the  menu  —  "  STRAWBERRIES  AND 
CREAM,  2s." 

"Why,"  I  said,  "don't  you  give  the  public  the 
opportunity  of  sharing  in  this  accident  of  profusion  ? 
Why  not  say  'Strawberries  and  cream,  6d.,'  for 
example  ?" 

"Oh  no,"  he  said,  "that  wouldn't  do.  They'd 
take  us  for  a  cheap  and  common  place.  Prices  must 
be  kept  up." 

"Then  it's  really  the  public  that  fix  the  prices?" 
I  hazarded. 

"Absolutely,"  he  replied. 

I  suppose  it  is. 


171 


Unlikely  Conversations 


VI.  —  A  FINANCIER 

"Yes,"  he  said,  "we  were  awfully  stoney,  but  it's 
better  now.  We  tided  over  the  crisis  all  right." 

"Do  tell  me  how,"  I  said.  "The  last  time  I  saw 
you  it  was  hopeless." 

"Jenny  had  an  inspiration,"  he  replied.  "She 
went  to  visit  an  old  school-friend  who  was  having  a 
baby,  and  the  thought  came  to  her  then." 

"Well?"  I  said. 

"Well,  it's  like  this.  If  you  have  a  baby  and 
advertise  it  in  the  papers  you  get  all  kinds  of  truck 
sent  you." 

"I  know,"  I  said.     "It's  a  regular  nuisance." 

"Oh,  is  it?"  he  replied.  "Wait  a  bit.  Look  at 
these." 

He  handed  me  three  tiny  slips  of  paper.  On  one 
I  read :  — 

"HIGGINSON.  — On  Wednesday,  the  29th 
September,  at  4  Wellington  Road,  W.,  the  wife  of 
HENRY  NOBLE  HIGGINSON,  of  twins,  daughters." 

On  another :  — 

"MAYOR. —  On  the  2nd  October,  at  98  Orme 
Square,  W.,  the  wife  of  ROBERT  Fox  WELL  MAYOR,  of 
twins,  son  and  daughter." 

And  on  the  third  :  — 

"SOLLY. —  On  the  4th  October,  at  99  Richmond 
172 


Babes  to  the  Rescue 

Villas,  W.,  the  wife  of  ADOLPHUS  SOLLY,  of  triplets, 
sons." 

"How  odd  !"  I  said,  as  I  returned  the  slips.  "Two 
twins  and  one  triplets.  That  must  be  very  unusual." 

"Very,"  he  said,  "but  not  impossible.  Not  too 
unlikely  for  good  art." 

"Art?"  I  inquired. 

"Of  course,"  he  answered,  "all  those  are  fakes. 
Inventions.  But  the  addresses  are  real :  friends  of 
mine  live  there." 

"I  don't  understand,"  I  said. 

"Why,"  he  replied,  "it's  as  plain  as  ninepence. 
These  advertisements  cost  me  six  bob  each,  a  sum 
which  I  had  no  difficulty  in.  borrowing  after  I  had 
explained  the  scheme.  They  go  into  the  Press,  and 
at  once  the  firms  that  send  out  all  the  free  truck 
begin  to  get  to  work.  Here  comes  in  the  point  of 
the  twins  and  triplets,  because  the  firms  send  twice 
or  three  times  as  much.  Do  you  see  ?  Now  I'll 
tell  you  what  the  harvest  is,  down  to  date  :  — 

"Seven  bottles  of  an  excellent  beef  extract,  retail 
3s.  6d.  a  bottle. 

"Seven  pieces  of  perfectly  beautiful  soap,  worth 
6d.  a  cake  at  least. 

"Seven  boxes  of  very  superior  violet  powder,  at 
say  Is. 

"Seven  pairs  knitted  socks,  worth  Is.  a  pair. 

"Twenty -one  tins  of  assorted  food  for  babies,  at  say 
Is.,  and  an  odd  lot  of  patent  safety-pins  and  things  like 
that.  Of  course  some  of  the  people  only  sent  things 

173 


Unlikely  Conversations 

on  approval,  to  be  paid  for  if  kept.  The  cheek  of 
them  !  But  most  were  free,  as  they  ought  to  be." 

"And  what  then?"  I  asked. 

"Well,  Jenny  unloaded  the  lot  on  young-mother 
friends  of  hers  for  three  pounds,  or  over  200  per  cent, 
on  our  outlay.  Brainy,  isn't  it?" 


174 


The  Provincial  Editor's  Letter-Bag    «o     <o 

I.  —  FROM  THE  VICAR 

DEAR  SIR,  —  I  have  read  in  the  current  num- 
ber of  The  Gazette  the  account  of  the  opening 
of  the  new  parish  hall,  and  am  pained  and  surprised 
to  find  how  many  excisions  have  been  made.  Surely, 
when  one  who  is  in  a  position  to  know  everything 
and  has  some  literary  skill  goes  to  the  trouble  to 
provide  you  with  free  copy,  it  is  at  once  inexpedient 
and  ungracious  to  abbreviate  and  distort. 

That  my  own  remarks  on  the  platform  should  be 
cut  short  is  nothing  to  me ;  but  I  think  it  very 
hard  that  the  admirable  little  speech  of  our  Squire 
(which  was  typed  expressly  for  you),  who  altered  his 
dinner-hour  hi  order  to  come  down  and  deliver  it, 
should  have  been  so  heartlessly  condensed.  He 
spoke  for  at  least  ten  minutes,  but  all  that  you 
allow  him  might  have  been  said  in  two.  This  is 
more  to  be  deplored  than  you  may  think,  for  Mr. 
Bamber-Guy  stands  to  Boreham  Green  in  the 
relation  of  wealthy  parent,  and  it  is  in  his  power  to 

175 


The  Provincial  Editor's  Letter-Bag 

make  or  mar  the  parish  room.  It  would  not  in  the 
least  surprise  me  to  hear  that  your  cavalier  treat- 
ment of  his  address  has  caused  him  to  reduce  his 
donations. 

Of  Miss  Pulham-AH ways'  singing  I  said,  according 
to  the  duplicate  copy  of  my  MS.  before  me,  "Her 
voice  is  both  pure  and  resonant,  and  she  rendered 
the  aria  with  faultless  precision  and  taste."  I  did 
not  write  this  idly.  The  words  expressed  my 
deliberate  opinion,  based  upon  a  careful  study  of 
music  that  has  lasted  many  years.  Moreover,  Mrs. 
Pulham-Allways  was  seated  next  to  me  and  was 
aware  not  only  of  my  appreciation  of  her  daughter's 
efforts  but  also  that  I  was  for  the  time  being  your 
representative.  What,  then,  do  I  feel  —  and  what 
must  she  feel  —  to  read  in  your  paper  the  bald 
statement  that  "Miss  Pulham-Allways  contributed 
a  meritorious  solo '»'  ? 

It  was  with  perfect  cognizance  of  what  I  was 
doing  that  I  inserted  the  name  of  the  maker  of  the 
excellent  bagatelle-board ;  but  your  ruthless  blue 
pencil  goes  through  it  without  a  thought.  I  am 
not  one  —  as  you  ought  to  know  —  who  does  things 
without  a  reason. 

If  ever  a  man  has  worn  himself  to  the  bone  in  a 
good  cause  and  for  no  possible  reward  save  the 
knowledge  that  he  has  done  his  duty,  it  is  Mr. 
Pykelet,  my  curate.  How  natural  and  proper,  then, 
that  I  should  single  him  out  for  praise  !  But  what 
do  you  do  ?  You  merely  group  him  with  half  a 
176 


An  Amateur  Journalist 

dozen  ordinary  villagers  who  may  have  lent  a  hand 
to  move  a  table,  or  done  something  purely  per- 
functory, and  say  that  they  were  "a  willing  band." 

So  much  for  sins  of  omission,  but  what  of  those  of 
commission  ?  Here  we  are  on  more  serious  ground. 
It  is  all  very  well,  owing  to  exigencies  of  space,  to 
condense  a  contribution,  but  it  is  a  very  different 
and  graver  thing  to  twist  and  change  a  contributor's 
meaning.  This  you  have  done  more  than  once. 

I  wrote,  for  instance,  very  thoughtfully  of  Miss 
Larcom's  voice,  that  no  doubt  with  practice  it  would 
greatly  improve  and  be  a  pleasure  to  listen  to.  But 
what  do  I  read  in  your  report?  —  "Miss  Larcom 
aroused  great  and  well-deserved  enthusiasm  by  her 
charming  morceaux."  How  do  you  know  that  ? 
You  have  no  right  to  go  behind  the  back  of  your 
accredited  critic.  Can  it,  I  wonder,  be  true  that 
Miss  Larcom  is  engaged  to  your  advertising  can- 
vasser, as  I  am  told  is  the  case  ?  If  so,  we  have  a 
very  reprehensible  suggestion  of  nepotism  at  work. 

Again,  I  find  that  you  say  of  Mr.  Harry  Wild- 
marsh's  recitation  that  it  was  "received  with  roars 
of  laughter."  That,  I  regret  to  say,  is  true ;  but 
what  you  do  not  print  is  my  opinion  as  to  its 
extreme  vulgarity  and  undesirability. 

I  notice  that  you  also  say  that  Mr.  Arthur  Corney 
had  done  "yeoman's  service  in  bringing  the  evening 
to  a  successful  issue."  I  am  aware  of  no  yeoman's  ser- 
vice (whatever  that  means)  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Corney. 
You  doubtless  have  private  reasons  of  your  own,  but 
N  177 


The  Provincial  Editor's  Letter-Bag 

alloy  me  to  reiterate  the  opinion  that  in  such  a 
matter  as  this  the  Vicar  is  more  likely  to  be  well 
informed  of  the  relative  value  of  each  helper  than 
you  can  possibly  be. 

No  doubt  you  will  reply  that  a  column  and  a  half 
is  long  measure  for  a  parochial  event  of  the  kind ; 
but  permit  me  to  inform  you  that  this  is  not  so.  The 
opening  of  a  parish  room  is  epoch-making.  Men 
who  hitherto  have  been  in  the  habit  of  spending 
their  evenings  in  the  public-house  will  now  con- 
gregate here  to  engage  in  blameless  pursuits,  and 
nothing  but  good  can  follow.  A  new  civic  life  will 
thus  be  set  up,  a  sociability  hitherto  unknown  in 
Boreham  Green.  Indirectly,  if  not  directly,  the  very 
Empire  must  be  the  gainer. 

I  shall  peruse  with  interest  any  reply  that  you 
care  to  send,  and  meanwhile  I  trust  that  some 
means  will  be  found  to  do  justice,  if  not  to  Miss 
Pulham-Allways,  at  least  to  Mr.  Pykelet,  in  your 
next  issue.  —  Yours  faithfully, 

GERALD  AMBERLEIGH. 


II.  —  FROM  COUNCILLOR  SCRASE 

DEAR  MR.  HEDGES,  —  I  am  venturing  to  send  you 
a  box  of  cigars  to  smoke  during  the  festive  season. 
They  are,  I  think,  not  bad,  and  I  know  that  you 

178 


Municipal  Politics 

are  one  who  can  appreciate  tobacco  when  you  meet 
with  it.  May  I  congratulate  you  on  your  article  on 
the  proposed  iniquitous  diversion  of  the  Charton 
Road  ?  It  seemed  to  me  admirable  both  in  substance 
and  manner,  although,  if  a  criticism  might  be  found, 
it  would  probably  bear  upon  the  lenience  of  your 
pen  and  your  too  kind  generalizations.  But  a  busy 
man  like  yourself,  with  a  thousand  duties,  many  of 
them  small  and  vexatious,  to  perform  (and,  indeed, 
Mrs.  Scrase  and  I  often  marvel  you  can  get  through 
it  all),  and  a  new-comer  among  us  too,  cannot  of 
course  be  in  a  position  to  know,  as  I,  for  example, 
must,  with  premises  right  on  the  present  road,  how 
utterly  unnecessary  and  contrary  to  public  interest 
this  step  is. 

You  look  at  the  case  from  the  broad  standpoint 
of  a  publicist ;  whereas  I,  who  have  lived  here  all 
my  life,  see  it  also  as  a  born  and  bred  Eastburian. 
To  me  and  mine,  and  I  assure  you  to  most  of  the 
town,  this  change  would  be  a  blow  too  severe  to 
contemplate  without  emotion.  Call  us  sentiment- 
alists if  you  will  — •  there  is  no  disgrace  in  that  —  but 
we,  like  yourself,  are  something  more  too.  We 
stand  for  what  is  right  and  just  against  the  new 
and  predatory  faction  which  follows  Mr.  Garner. 
It  is  therefore  that  I  say,  More  power  to  your 
elbow  ! 

The  cigars,  I  ought  to  tell  you,  are  of  the  famous 
1899  crop  and  are  absolutely  ready  for  smoking. 
But  you  should  keep  them  in  a  warm  place.  If 
179 


The  Provincial  Editor's  Letter-Bae 

o 

you  have  a  cupboard  near  a  chimney,  so  much  the 
better. 

With    all    the    compliments  of    the  season,  believe 
me,  dear  Mr.  Hedges,  yours  cordially, 

SIMON  SCBASE. 


III.  —  FROM  COUNCILLOR  GARNER 

MY  DEAR  HEDGES,  —  Christmas  being  on  us,  I  take 
the  opportunity  of  sending  you  a  case  of  sherry,  a 
wine  which  is,  I  am  glad  to  say,  coming  into  fashion 
again.  So  far  as  I  am  concerned  it  never  went  out, 
and  my  father  before  me  was  true  to  it  too. 

If  you  would  bring  Mrs.  Hedges  to  supper  on 
Boxing  Day  it  would  give  Mrs.  Garner  and  myself 
very  great  pleasure,  and  we  would  have  a  jolly 
evening  and  forget  for  once  that  there  were  any 
troubles  or  differences  of  opinion  on  anything,  or 
that  there  existed  so  trumpery  an  affair  as  this 
Charton  Road  diversion,  on  which  I  see  you  take  a 
surprising  and,  for  you,  not  too  well-informed  line. 

I  wish  you  had  consulted  me  before  writing  that 
article,  as  I  am  probably  the  only  man  in  Eastbury 
who  really  knows  all  the  facts.  No  doubt  certain 
persons  on  the  present  road  will  suffer,  but  the 
public  good  is  the  only  thing  to  be  considered  —  the 
welfare  of  the  greatest  number.  Moreover,  Lord 
Aberley  gives  the  land,  and  that  means  much, 
180 


Municipal  Politics 

especially  when  you  remember  how  important  is  his 
goodwill  to  Eastbury  as  a  whole.  But  this  is  talking 
shop,  and  that  I  have  no  wish  to  do. 

Let  me  have  a  line  saying  that  Mrs  Hedges 
and  you  will  honour  us ;  and,  hoping  that  the  wine 
will  be  to  your  taste,  believe  me,  with  all  good 
wishes  for  a  Merry  Christmas  and  a  Happy  New  Year, 
yours  sincerely,  RUFUS  GARNER. 


181 


Tracts  that  took  the  Wrong  Turning         -Qy 

I.  —  WHAT'S  THE  ODDS  ? 

ONCE  upon  a  time  there  was  a  small  tradesman 
named  John  Stone.  He  was  an  honest,  hard- 
working man,  who  did  his  best  to  make  both  ends 
meet  and  support  his  wife  and  three  small  children. 
But,  try  as  he  might,  custom  left  his  shop,  while  to 
make  things  worse,  his  assistant  robbed  him,  and 
he  found  himself  one  morning  with  only  ten  pounds 
between  himself  and  the  bankruptcy  court.  His 
debts  amounted  to  over  thirty  pounds,  and  more 
stock  was  needed. 

In  his  despair  he  went  for  a  walk,  and  chanced 
to  meet  an  old  schoolfellow  named  James  Smith. 
"Hullo,  John,"  said  James,  "why  do  you  look  so 
glum?"  John  told  him.  "It  is  lucky  you  met 
me,"  was  the  reply,  "  for  I've  got  a  tip  for  the  races 
to-morrow  which  can't  fail.  Take  my  advice.  Put 
your  ten  pounds  on  it." 

John  Stone  had  never  made  a  bet  in  his  life  and 
he  was  reluctant  to  do  so  now,  but  at  last  he  let 
182 


Against  All  Precedent 

James  persuade  him,  and  the  next  morning  handed 
him  the  ten  pounds. 

All  that  day,  until  the  news  of  the  race  reached 
London,  John  Stone  was  in  an  agony.  He  dared 
not  look  his  wife  in  the  face,  and  in  his  business 
was  so  absent-minded  that  his  few  customers  thought 
he  must  be  ill.  At  last  he  saw  a  boy  rushing  down 
the  street  with  a  paper,  and  calling  to  him  he 
bought  one  and  feverishly  tore  it  open.  His  horse 
had  won  — at  20  to  1.  John  Stone  had  made  £200; 
and  that  night  James  brought  him  this  sum  together 
with  the  £10  he  had  wagered. 

John  Stone  immediately  paid  all  his  debts, 
acquired  some  new  and  attractive  stock,  and  at  once 
began  to  prosper ;  and  he  is  now  the  owner  of  a 
row  of  shops.  He  is  also  a  respected  town  councillor 
and  churchwarden. 

In  spite  of  all  temptation  to  do  so,  he  never  made 
another  bet. 


II.  —  THEIR  FIRST  DRINKS 

Henry  Martin  had  been  brought  up  by  his  parents 
as  a  strict  teetotaller,  and  until  his  twenty-fifth  year 
he  remained  so.  Then  one  evening  he  went  to 
a  smoking  concert  and  was  induced,  much  against 
his  will,  to  drink  a  glass  of  whisky  and  soda-water. 

183 


Tracts  that  took  the  Wrong  Turning 

That  was  thirty  years  ago,  and  the  taste  so  disgusted 
him  that  he  has  never  repeated  the  experiment. 

George  Dundas  was  also  brought  up  as  a  strict 
teetotaller,  being  taught  not  only  to  look  upon 
alcohol  as  poison,  but  upon  those  who  took  it  as 
sinners.  One  day  he  was  dared  by  a  companion  to 
drink  a  glass  of  beer,  and  rather  than  be  called  a 
coward  he  did  so.  He  was  astonished  first  to  find 
it  agreeable,  and  secondly,  after  drinking  it,  not  to 
be  rolling  about  the  floor  in  a  state  of  beastly 
intoxication,  or  lurching  home  to  beat  his  wife  and 
throw  his  children  out  of  the  window.  The  con- 
sequence was  that  the  next  evening  he  took  another 
glass,  and  has  enjoyed  his  beer  regularly  ever  since, 
and  is  now  a  hale  old  man  of  ninety -seven. 


III.  —  THE  RESULT  OF  PETTY  THEFT 

Thomas  Sand  and  Arthur  Wheeler  were  two 
village  lads  who  lived  near  each  other  and  always 
walked  to  and  from  school  together.  One  day  they 
noticed  that  Farmer  Brown's  orchard  gate,  which 
was  usually  locked,  was  open,  and  they  peeped  in. 
Just  in  front  of  them  was  a  tree  covered  with 
beautiful  ripe  apples.  They  looked  in  all  directions, 
but  no  one  was  in  sight,  and  in  a  few  moments  the 
boys  had  shaken  down  enough  apples  to  fill  their 
184 


Against  All  Precedent 

pockets  and  were  again  in  the  road  enjoying  the 
plunder.  Just  as  they  turned  the  corner  whom 
should  they  meet  but  Farmer  Brown  with  his  big 
whip  ?  He  looked  at  the  apples  they  were  munching 
and  recognized  them  as  his  own.  "Hullo,  you 
young  Socialists  !  "  he  said,  with  a  laugh.  The  boys 
grew  up  to  positions  of  trust  and  are  now  J.  P.'s. 


185 


Wayside  Notes    -^       *cy       -o       -o       *^> 

I.  —  THE  SNOW-WHITE  LIE 

HE  is  sixty-five  years  of  age  and  usually  looks  it. 
A  tall  ruddy  man,  with  a  great  shock  of  iron- 
grey  hair,  and,  though  walking  a  little  creakingly, 
as  sons  of  the  soil  must  do  in  later  years,  he  is  still 
active  and  powerful,  but  —  sixty -five.  .  .  . 

Now  sixty -five  is  all  right  if  you  have  a  good  master 
and  have  been  in  his  employ  for  a  long  time;  but 
sixty-five  is  the  devil  if  you  are  seeking  a  new  job. 
And  Old  Jack,  as  we  have  thoughtlessly  called  him 
(Heaven  forgive  our  want  of  prescience !),  after 
seeming  to  be  as  deeply  rooted  here  as  any  tree,  was, 
three  weeks  ago,  suddenly  told  that  he  would  not 
be  wanted  after  that  Saturday.  For  how  many 
years  he  had  lived  in  this  village  and  done  his  daily 
task  on  the  same  farm,  I  cannot  say,  but  certainly 
for  nearly  forty,  and  never  an  hour  off  for  illness 
in  all  that  time.  And  now  he  had  to  go ;  find  a 
new  master,  a  new  cottage ;  begin  again. 

He  tried  near  about,  day  after  day,  for  a  week, 
1 86 


Old  Jack 

but  to  no  purpose,  and  then  began  to  extend  his 
view,  giving  up  all  hope  of  remaining  among  his 
old  neighbours,  and  one  evening  he  brought  me  an 
advertisement  clipped  from  a  paper.  "Would  you 
mind  answering  that?"  he  asked;  for  Jack  did  not 
want  to  be  beholden  to  his  late  employer  for  any- 
thing, and  he  is  one  of  those  fortunate  creatures  who 
can  neither  read  nor  write. 

So  I  answered  it.  I  said  that  I  had  known  Jack 
for  so  long ;  that  he  was  sober,  willing,  agreeable, 
capable,  and  all  the  rest  of  it;  and  that  he  had  been 
dismissed  through  no  fault  of  his  own,  but  because 
the  farmer  was  making  changes  all  round.  And,  I 
added,  "he  is  fifty-eight."  Last  night  Jack  came  to 
tell  me  he  had  got  the  place. 

His  serious  trouble  will  come  when  it  is  time  to 
draw  his  old-age  pension ;  mine,  when  I  confront 
St.  Peter. 


II.  —  Two  DREAMS 

Amid  the  welter  of  idiotic  fancies  that  crowd 
one's  sleeping  mind,  now  and  then  will  emerge  a 
definite  and  not  unsensible  thought.  Some  dreamers 
may  have  these  oftener,  but  with  me  their  appearance 
is  certainly  less  than  once  a  year.  Once,  for  example, 
long  ago,  I  woke  in  a  state  of  excited  triumph  at  a 
revelation  that  had  suddenly  broken  in  upon  me  as 
187 


Wayside  Notes 

with  the  light  of  noon.  "That's  extraordinary,"  I  said 
to  myself,  "I  must  write  it  down  at  once."  I  have 
said  this  before  and  gone  to  sleep  before  I  could 
get  the  paper,  or  on  beginning  to  write  have  found 
it  rubbish ;  but  this  particular  trouvaille  was  better, 
for  the  next  morning  I  found  I  had  written  this : 
"Witches  are  composite  like  ourselves.  Witches  are 
both  good  and  bad.  There  are  no  merely  witches." 
Last  night,  however,  I  did  better  than  that  (which, 
after  all,  is  only  metaphysics),  for  I  dreamed  a  Sancho 
Panza  proverb,  and  I  claim  for  it  such  excellence  — 
such  all-round  sagacity  —  that  if  it  were  dropped  into 
a  collection  like  the  late  Ulick  Burke's  Spanish  Salt, 
it  would  defy  detection  as  an  imposture.  This  is  it : 
"There  are  two  words  for  everything."  Surely  that 
is  wisdom  !  The  whole  theory  of  party  politics  is  in 
it,  for  one  thing ;  and  indeed  all  argument.  It 
should  pass  into  the  language  as  a  salient  sapience: 
"There  are  two  words  for  everything."  And  I  made 
it  up  in  my  sleep. 


III.  —  THE  COMPACT 

"Pathos?"    he    said.         "I'll  tell    you  something 
pathetic.      When    I    was   at    Bart.'s    I    had   a    great 

friend,  another  student,  named  Lewin.  That  was, 

let  me  see,  more  than  forty  years  ago.  We  were 

both    devoted    to    music ;    I    played    the  violin,    he 
1 88 


The  Old  Friends 

the  'cello ;  and  we  spent  a  great  deal  of  time  at  the 
opera.  When  we  were  through,  I  stayed  on  for  a 
while  as  H.  P.,  and  Lewin  went  on  a  P.  &  O.  boat 
as  ship's  doctor,  and  taking  a  fancy  to  the  East 
remained  out  there.  Well,  when  we  parted  on  the 
night  before  he  sailed,  we  made  an  undertaking 
that  whenever  we  next  met,  and  at  all  our  future 
meetings,  each  of  us  would  greet  the  other  by 
whistling  the  opening  notes  of  Beethoven's  Eighth 

Symphony.  You  know  how  it  goes "  and  he 

whistled  it. 

"Well,"  he  continued,  "when  we  made  that 
promise  we  expected  to  meet  often,  for  he  had  then 
no  notion  of  settling  in  Japan.  But  settle  he  did, 
and  he  came  back  to  England  for  the  first  time  only 
last  week.  I  had  heard  from  him  now  and  then, 
and  a  brief  letter  came  the  other  day  announcing 
his  arrival  and  asking  me  to  dine  with  him  at  his 
hotel.  'Come  up  to  my  room,'  he  added.  So  I 
went.  He  was  on  the  top  floor,  and  as  I  approached 
his  room  a  chambermaid  came  along  and  told  me  he 
was  there  and  the  door  had  been  left  open  for  me. 
Just  as  I  put  my  hand  to  the  knob  I  recollected  our 
old  agreement  and,  standing  on  the  door-mat,  I  began 
to  whistle.  Funny  I  should  have  forgotten  it  till  I 
was  so  near  him  ;  but  I  had. 

"He  made  no  response,  but,  hearing  him  moving 

about  inside,   I  repeated   it  louder.       Again   he  did 

not  respond ;  so  I  pushed  the  door  open  and  marched 

in  in  full  blast,  like  a  drum  and  fife  band.       He  ran 

189 


Wayside  Notes 

to  grasp  my  hand,  shook  it  warmly  and  thrust  me 
into  a  chair.  '  But  why  didn't  you  whistle  too  ? ' 
I  asked  him.  He  looked  at  me  blankly  for  a 
moment  and  then  fetched  an  ear-trumpet  from  the 
table.  He  had  become  totally  deaf." 


IV.  —  SPOILED  STORIES 

It  is  a  melancholy  experience  to  come  upon  an 
old  and  favourite  joke  badly  mauled ;  and,  unhappily, 
as  England  becomes  more  and  more  in  love  with 
facetiousness,  the  experience  is  likely  to  get  more 
and  more  common.  One  of  the  Worst  examples  I 
have  lately  found  in  a  sixpenny  illustrated  paper. 
It  runs  thus  :  — 

"The  flooding  of  a  Yorkshire  mine  had  a  tragic 
result,  and  a  miner  was  deputed  to  break  the  news 
to  a  poor  woman  whose  husband  had  been  drowned. 
'Does  Widow  Jones  live  here?'  'No,'  was  the 
indignant  lady's  reply.  '  You  re  a  liar!'  he  said." 

This  morning,  after  much  search,  I  put  my  hands 
on  the  volume  containing  the  original  story  as  it  was 
written  by  a  master  between  forty  and  fifty  years 
ago.  I  have  copied  it  out :  — 

;  'Yes,  I    remember    that  anecdote,'    the  Sunday- 
school   superintendent   said,   with   the   old   pathos   in 
his   voice,   and   the   old   sad    look   in   his   eyes.      'It 
190 


Mark's  Way 

was  about  a  simple  creature  named  Higgins,  that 
used  to  haul  rock  for  old  Maltby.  When  the 
lamented  Judge  Bagley  tripped  and  fell  down  the 
court-house  stairs  and  broke  his  neck,  it  was  a  great 
question  how  to  break  the  news  to  poor  Mrs.  Bagley. 
But  finally  the  body  was  put  into  Higgins'  wagon, 
and  he  was  instructed  to  take  it  to  Mrs.  B.,  but  to 
be  very  guarded  and  discreet  in  his  language,  and 
not  break  the  news  to  her  at  once,  but  do  it 
gradually  and  gently.  When  Higgins  got  there 
with  his  sad  freight,  he  shouted  till  Mrs.  Bagley 
came  to  the  door. 

"Then  he  said,  'Does  the  Widder  Bagley  live  here  ?' 

"  'The  Widow  Bagley  ?     No,  sir  !' 

"  'I'll  bet  she  does.     But  have  it  your  own  way. 
Well,  does  Judge  Bagley  live  here  ? ' 
'Yes;  Judge  Bagley  lives  here.' 
'  'I'll  bet  he  don't.     But  never  mind,  it  ain't  for  me 
to  contradict.     Is  the  Judge  in  ?  ' 

"  'No,  not  at  present.' 

'  '  I  jest  expected  as  much.     Because,  you  know 

Take  hold  o'  suthing,  mum,  for  I'm  a-going  to  make 
a  little  communication,  and  I  reckon  maybe  it'll  jar 
you  some.  There's  been  an  accident,  mum.  I've 
got  the  old  Judge  curled  up  out  here  in  the  wagon, 
and  when  you  see  him  you'll  acknowledge  yourself 
that  an  inquest  is  about  the  only  thing  that  could  be 
a  comfort  to  him!  ' ' 

That   is   by   Mark   Twain,   and   to   my   mind   is  a 
perfect  example  of  the  art  of  telling  a  story. 
191 


Wayside  Notes 


V.  —  How  POETRY  CAME  TO  THE  COURSE 

"Now,  ladies,  if  you  really  want  something  to 
do,"  said  the  owner,  "name  my  three  yearlings 
for  me." 

"Oh,  how  delightful!"  they  exclaimed  in  one 
voice. 

"But  remember,"  he  continued,  "that  the  names 
should  be  good  ones.  The  year  after  next,  one  of 
them  may  run  in  the  Derby,  and  no  horse  with  a 
bad  name  ever  won  that." 

"Of  course,"  said  the  first  lady.  "But  who 
would  give  a  beautiful  race-horse  a  common  name?" 

"Lots  of  people,"  said  the  owner.  "There's  a 
horse  at  this  moment  called  'Done  in  the  Eye.'  '; 

The  ladies  shuddered. 

"You'll  get  nothing  like  that  from  me,"  said  the 
second  lady,  "I  can  promise  you.  I  shall  find  you 
a  lovely  romantic  name,  all  melody  and  fragrance. 
What  do  you  say,  for  example,  to  —  to  'Tristram'?" 

"Or  ' Hyacinthus '  ? "  said  the  second  lady. 

"Or   'Saladin'  ?"   said   the   third. 

"Charming,  charming !"  replied  the  owner. 
"There's  only  one  criticism  I  should  make :  all 
the  horses  are  fillies." 

"Women's  names,"  said  the  first  lady,  "are  more 

beautiful    than    men's.     I    have   chosen    one    for   my 

filly  already  — '  Undine '  —  the  wonderful  water-nymph 

of  Fouque's  story.     Could  there  be  a  more  magical 

192 


Job  Masters 

name  than  '  Undine '  ?  It  will  bring  music  to  the 
race-card,  poetry  to  the  course." 

"And  my  choice  is  'Thalia,'  the  Muse  of  idyllic 
verse,"  said  the  second  lady. 

"And  mine,"  said  the  third,  "is  the  most  fragile 
and  exquisite  of  flowers  —  'Anemone.'  " 

"Right-O,"  said  the  owner,  and  wrote  them  down. 

A  year  later  the  fillies  were  running  in  various 
races. 

'  'Ere  you  are,  sir,"  cried  the  bookmakers. 
"Eight  to  one  'The  liar'  !  Two  hundred  to  a  pony, 
'The  liar'!" 

"Sixes  'Any  money'  !"  they  cried. 

"Now,  then,"  they  cried;  "here's  your  chance. 
Twelve  to  one  against  'Undone'  !  Twelve  to  one 
'Undone'  !" 


VI.  —  R.  I.  P. 

An  acute  French  traveller  wandering  observantly 
through  England  once  remarked  that  every  town 
seemed  to  have  several  men  named  Job  Masters, 
and  he  wondered  that  no  confusion  resulted.  Alas  ! 
a  time  has  come,  or  is  about  to  come,  when  no 
traveller,  French,  or  otherwise,  will  ever  say  this 
again.  For  Job  Masters  is  dead.  The  game  is  up. 
Where  once  was  his  stable  is  now  a  garage ;  where 

o  193 


Wayside  Notes 

once  was  his  horse  is  now  an  internal  combusion 
engine;  where  once  was  his  "fly"  (strange  but 
cherished  misnomer !)  is  now  a  motor-car.  The 
end  may  not  be  quite  yet,  but  it  draws  near  and 
nearer  every  moment.  And  being  so  near,  and  this 
being  an  age  of  haste  and  anticipation,  let  his  epitaph 
be  written :  — 

SACRED  TO  THE  MEMORY  OF  POOR 
JOB  MASTERS, 

Who,  patient  as  his  great  namesake, 
waited  steadily  to  be  employed, 
on  no  nourishment  but  a  straw. 
He  was  always  ready  to  drive  anybody  anywhere, 

in  rain  or  shine,  heat  or  cold. 
His  horses  were  old  and  his  carriages 

were  older, 

but  they  were  all  we  could  get, 
and  we  had  to  put  up 

with  them. 

His  watchwords  were  Livery  and  Bait, 

and  he  will  be  sadly  missed. 

His  end  was  Petrol. 

What  an  irony  of  circumstance  it  will  be  if,  when 
the  melancholy  day  arrives,  Job  Masters  has  a  motor 
funeral ! 


VII.  —  THE  "WHITEBAIT" 

Stories  of  money-lenders  are  usually  good  reading 
—  for    those    who    do    not    happen    to    have    gone 
194 


Lawyer  Ford 

a-sorrowing.  A  man  to  be  a  successful  money-lender 
must  also  be  something  of  a  commander  too.  He 
must  have  certain  of  those  qualities  of  shrewdness 
and  observation  that  are  the  stuff  of  success ;  he 
must  be  very  much  a  man  of  the  world.  Such  was 
the  famous  lawyer  Ford,  of  Henrietta  Street,  better 
known  by  his  trade  name  of  "George  Samuel,"  who 
died  in  1868  after  a  crowded  career  as  a  racing 
man  and  financier  of  the  gilt-edged  needy.  Many 
stories  were  told  of  him  that  would  entitle  him  to 
a  place  in  any  study  of  those  useful  and  unlovely 
buttresses  of  society,  but  the  one  that  particularly 
pleases  me  is  concerned  with  an  occasion  when  he 
was  a  victim. 

George  had  a  horse  named  "Quo  Minus"  running 
for  the  Ascot  Stakes,  and  he  was  there  to  see  the 
race.  He  was  there  also  to  hand  over  to  a  client  a 
loan  of  £7000,  which  he  carried  in  notes  of  all 
sizes  in  his  pocket-book,  but  which  the  client  had 
declined  to  receive  until  the  races  were  over. 
George,  therefore,  was  standing  by  the  paddock  rails 
intent  on  the  running,  when  a  small  boy  leaped  on 
his  shoulders  crying  out,  "  'Quo  Minus'  wins  !  'Quo 
Minus'  wins !  "  Mark  the  cleverness  of  this.  Had 
he  said  anything  else,  the  money-lender  would  have 
angrily  shaken  him  off,  but  such  confidence  in  "Quo 
Minus,"  his  own  horse,  was  flattering.  However,  he 
did  order  the  boy  to  get  off,  and  after  the  failure  of 
''Quo  Minus"  was  a  certainty  the  boy  did  so  and 
disappeared,  and  with  him  went  the  pocket-book. 

195 


Wayside  Notes 

Samuel,  in  his  disgust  and  rage,  sought  advice  from 
Lord  Chesterfield,  who  knew  most  of  the  ropes,  and 
he  at  once  offered  counsel.  "Go  to  Canty,"  he  said, 
naming  a  well-known  loose  character  of  the  middle 
of  the  last  century,  who  not  only  kept  a  gaming- 
house, but  did  a  considerable  business  as  a  receiver 
of  stolen  goods.  Off  went  George,  therefore,  to 
Canty,  who  welcomed  him  with  the  remark,  "I 
know  what  you've  come  about."  "Do  you?"  said 
George.  "Yes,"  said  Canty,  "and  I  fancy  it  can 
be  managed,  but  you  must  give  up  all  hope  of  ever 
seeing  the  whitebait  again."  "Whitebait!"  ex- 
claimed Samuel,  "what  on  earth  is  the  whitebait?" 
"Why,"  said  Canty,  "the  little  fish  —  the  twenties 
and  the  tenners  and  the  fivers.  The  rest  I'll  try 
and  get  back  for  you."  And  so  he  did ;  but  Samuel 
never  ceased  to  regret  the  whitebait,  even  though 
be  often  told  the  story  with  gusto. 


VIII.  —  THE  NICE  THINGS 

Denmark  (which  gave  us  Hamlet  and  Queen 
Alexandra  and  Genee)  has  had  a  very  charming 
thought.  According  to  the  Copenhagen  corre- 
spondent of  the  Daily  Mail,  the  Danish  Herbert 
Samuel  has  hit  upon  the  following  means  of  pro- 
viding money  for  the  indigent  blind  of  that  country. 
196 


The  Blind  Box 

The  Postmaster-General  lias  ordered  (since  he  seems 
to  be  Master  of  the  Mint  too)  a  coin  to  be  struck 
which  bears  the  words,  "The  child  seeing  the  light 
for  the  first  time  presents  a  tribute  to  the  child  who 
will  never  see  it."  These  coins,  or  rather  tokens, 
will  be  sold  to  the  parents  of  all  babies  having  sight, 
as  lucky  charms,  for  whatever  they  will  care  to  give, 
and  the  money  thus  acquired  will  go  to  a  fund  for 
those  poor  darkened  others. 

Reading  this,  my  thoughts  travelled  to  a  passage 
in  a  recent  work  on  Italy,  by  Mr.  Richard  Bagot, 
which  I  copy  here,  since  it  is  cognate  to  the  piteous 
theme  and  has  a  similar  vein  of  gold  running 
through  it  :  — 

"In  the  famous  theatre.  La  Scala  —  which,  with 
the  San  Carlo  at  Naples,  is  the  largest  opera-house 
in  the  world  —  there  is  a  mysterious  box  immediately 
above  the  stage  on  the  fifth  tier  which  appears  to 
be  always  unoccupied.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  how- 
ever, this  box  is  never  empty  when  opera  is  being 
performed.  Screened  from  the  gaze  of  the  public, 
the  most  appreciative  of  all  among  the  audience  are 
following  every  note  of  the  music  from  its  recesses. 
Men  and  women  sit  in  that  box  entranced  —  trans- 
ported temporarily  into  another  world,  a  world  in 
which  they  can  forget  that  they  are  not  as  the 
majority  of  their  fellow-creatures,  and  are  able,  if 
only  for  a  few  hours,  to  feel  that  no  dark  and 
hopeless  veil  exists  between  then  and  the  rest  of 
197 


Wayside  Notes 

humanity.  They  are  all  blind,  the  occupants  of  this 
box.  Some  sixty  years  ago  a  Milanese  lady,  who 
was  the  proprietress  in  the  freehold  of  a  box  in  La 
Scala,  bequeathed  her  rights  to  the  then  Archbishop 
of  Milan,  and  the  Archbishop  made  them  over  to  an 
asylum  for  the  blind  on  the  condition  that  the  box 
should  for  ever  be  devoted  to  the  exclusive  use  of 
its  inmates. 

"In  order  that  these  should  enjoy  to  the  full  the 
intentions  of  the  donor,  the  directors  of  the  theatre 
accorded  to  the  blind  tenants  of  the  box  the 
privilege  of  free  entry  into  the  theatre  —  a  grant 
in  itself  sufficiently  generous,  since  in  all  Italian 
theatres  an  entrance  fee  of  sums  ranging  up  to  five 
francs  is  demanded  in  excess  of  the  sum  paid  for  the 
place  occupied.  I  wonder  if  any  spot  in  the  wide 
world  contains  so  much  concentrated  happiness  as 
this  box  in  La  Scala  on  an  opera  night.  The  blind 
are  sent  there  in  rotation,  so  that  all  the  inmates  of 
the  institution  may  have  one  or  more  evenings'  bliss 
in  the  course  of  the  season.  To  them  an  evening 
at  La  Scala  is  an  evening  spent  in  Paradise." 

Now,  it  would  be  very  interesting,  would  it  not  ? 
if  similar  examples  of  thoughtful  and  imaginative 
kindness  from  other  nations  could  be  collected  and 
brought  together  in  a  magazine  or  review,  or  even, 
a  daily  paper.  The  world  cannot  be  too  widely 
instructed  in  such  deeds. 


198 


My  Stores 

IX.  —  ACCOUNTS  DELIGHTFULLY  RENDERED 

I  have  discovered  a  new  shop  —  or  rather  Stores  — 
with  a  most  ingratiating  way  of  composing  its  bills. 
Not  that  any  process  (except  a  premature  and 
miraculous  receipt  stamp)  could  make  a  bill 
essentially  and  au  fond  other  than  it  is  —  a  de- 
testable thing.  But  since  apparently  there  must 
be  bills,  it  is  pleasant  to  get  them  made  readable,  not 
alone  by  the  chance  of  discovering  an  arithmetical 
inexactitude,  but  for  their  own  sake  as  —  more  or 
less  —  literature. 

As  a  rule  I  do  not  look  at  bills ;  but  chancing  to 
glance  at  one  the  other  day,  my  eye  met  the  follow- 
ing item :  — 

"  1  partridge  that  has  been  hung  long 
enough  to  be  suitable  for  Sunday 
lunch  .....  3s.  6d." 

"Why  all  this?"  I  asked  of  the  chatelaine. 
"Yes,"  she  replied,  "isn't  it  odd?  They  always 
repeat  my  words  in  their  bills."  "And  how  long 
have  we  been  dealing  there?"  I  asked.  "About 
three  weeks,"  she  said.  "And  you  never  told  me  !" 
I  remonstrated.  "In  this  grey  world,  you  never  told 
me.  Let  me  see  some  other  specimens,  I  implore." 

She  brought  them,  and  I  was  charmed.     I  read :  — 

"1    dozen    absolutely    new-laid    eggs,    with 
the   dates   legibly   on   them,    brown   for 
choice     ......       2s.," 

199 


Wayside  Notes 

and 

"1  really  tender  duckling  (the  last  wasn't)  .  4s.," 
and 

"A    shoulder    of    Welsh    mutton    just    large 

enough  for  four  persons        .  .          3s.  2d." 

Such  bills  as  these  are  not  only  reminders  of 
what  you  owe,  but  of  what  you  were.  They  are  bio- 
graphical. 

"Splendid,"  I  said.  "Now  we  will  really  put 
them  to  the  test."  So  I  drew  up  an  order  which, 
among  other  things  carefully  described,  included  "a 
pork-pie,  about  2  lb.,  not  the  kind  with  crust  like 
plaster  of  Paris,  but  a  soft  short  crust  into  which 
the  flavour  of  the  meat  has  found  its  way." 

"There,"  I  said,  "that  will  beat  them."  But  I 
was  wrong.  When  the  bill  came  in,  in  a  neat 
clerky  hand  on  the  blue  paper  was  written,  without 
the  faintest  sign  to  indicate  whether  the  writer  was 
a  humorist  or  a  machine,  this  item  :  — 

"1  pork-pie,  2  lb.,  not  the  kind  with  crust 
like  plaster  of  Paris,  but  a  soft  short 
crust,  into  which  the  flavour  of  the 
meat  has  found  its  way  .  .  2s.  4d." 

Who   would   ever   choose   to   deal   anywhere   else  ? 


200 


The  Fourpenny  Box      <^y        *£>•        *^y        <^y 

I.  —  THE  WAY  WITH  A  LORD 

WHEN  the  time  comes  to  pass  under  review 
one's  roll  of  fortuitous  acquaintances,  many  of 
us  whose  habit  it  is  to  loaf  in  the  Charing  Cross  Road 
(best  of  thoroughfares  since  Holywell  Street  was  tum- 
bled down  by  an  immoral  County  Council)  will  find 
that  the  most  amusing  company  has  been  fished  from 
fourpenny  boxes  and  dusty  shelves.  In  this  way  a 
few  months  ago  I  met  Joseph  Brasb  ridge,  and  in 
this  way  last  week  I  met  Henry  Melton.  Joseph 
Brasbridge  was  a  silversmith  in  Fleet  Street,  and  a 
considerable  dog  when  the  shutters  were  up,  dwin- 
dling, in  his  eightieth  year,  to  a  reflective  auto- 
biographer  (not  wholly,  however,  lost  to  the  taste  of 
ginger  in  the  mouth)  under  the  formidable  title 
of  The  Fruits  of  Experience.  Of  him,  for  the 
present,  I  say  no  more.  He  is  already  old  in  bottle 
and  will  keep.  But  Henry  Melton  demands  atten- 
tion, because  Henry  Melton,  of  all  of  us,  knew  the 
right  way  of  a  man  with  a  lord,  and  lords  were  never 
so  under  the  microscope  as  they  have  lately  been. 

201 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

Brasbridge  published  in  1824 ;  Melton,  who  was 
hatter  to  the  late  King  when  Prince  of  Wales, 
published  forty  and  more  years  later,  and  called  his 
book  Hints  on  Hats,  although  its  true  value 
(which  so  often  is  not  where  the  author  deems  it)  is 
its  hints  on  Melton.  The  hat  part  is  nothing :  you 
may  get  it  in  any  cyclopaedia ;  but  Mr.  Melton  in 
relation  to  his  patrons  is  everything. 

Mr.  Melton  senior  had  £100,000,  and  the  son  was 
educated  to  inherit  it.  But  "a  reverse  in  the  will 
of  Dame  Fortune"  ("that  fickle  jade,"  as  he  finely 
calls  her,)  made  it  necessary  to  enter  business. 

"About  this  time  [he  writes]  the  successful  career 
of  the  famous  Mr.  Moore,  the  hatter,  attracted  my 
attention.  The  fashionable  position  of  his  son,  his 
four-in-hand,  his  general  reception  into  good  society, 
his  reputation  as  a  patron  of  art  and  belles  lettres, 
pointed  to  well-earned  wealth  in  trade  as  something 
worthy  a  young  gentleman's  ambition ;  so  I  made 
up  my  mind  to  be  a  Hatter,  and  set  forth,  with  the 
earnest  enthusiasm  of  youth,  on  a  career  which  I 
expected  would  lead  certainly  to  wealth  and  fame." 

That  was,  I  gather,  in  the  thirties ;  and  with  not 
a  little  sagacity  for  one  who  had  spent  so  much  time 
in  expecting  to  be  well  off,  the  young  man  selected 
the  Last  of  the  Dandies  —  then  still  cutting  a  figure 
at  Gore  House  and  in  the  Row  —  as  his  first  client. 

"With   the   dash   of   youth   I   at   once   threw   my 

202 


Count  D'Orsay 

bread  upon  the  water,  and  wrote  to  the  Count 
in  as  delicate  a  manner  as  I  well  could,  stating 
my  ambition  as  desirous  of  making  even  my 
calling  associated  with  art  and  taste.  By  return  of 
post  I  received  a  courteously  worded  request  to  wait 
upon  the  Count  at  Kensington  Gore.  Here  I  was 
received  in  the  true  style  in  which  an  exquisite 
might  be  expected  to  welcome  an  aspirant  to  taste. 
I  stood  before  him,  in  my  own  opinion,  the  Ben- 
venuto  Cellini  of  hats  before  a  Pope  —  honoured  in 
the  greatness  of  my  patron,  but  still,  in  my  own  con- 
ceit, a  master  of  my  art.  I  soon  had  reason  for  some 
diffidence  as  to  my  own  merits,  even  in  my  own 
business,  and  speedily  recognized  the  master  mind 
of  elegance  and  fashion. 

"The  Count,  upon  receiving  me,  evidently  felt 
resolved  to  test  the  aspiring  youth  who  had  ad- 
dressed him.  He  quickly  requested  me  to  point 
out  what,  according  to  my  views,  should  constitute 
the  essential  merits  of  a  hat. 

"On  a  table  in  the  Count's  dressing-room  I  observed 
some  fourteen  hats  lying  all  ready  for  wear.  The 
Count  seemed  rather  pleased  with  my  zeal ;  and  this 
kind  reception,  as  well  as  his  refined  and  elegant 
manner,  encouraged  me  in  the  discussion  which 
ensued  upon  the  subject  of  hats,  and  ended  in  our 
mutually  agreeing  that  the  desiderata  in  regard  to  a 
hat  consisted  in  its  being  light,  although  of  a  sub- 
stance sufficient  to  retain  its  shape  (a  requisite  in 
which  all  foreign-made  hats  were  at  that  time,  and 
203 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

are  even  now,  deficient) ;  that  it  should  be  water- 
proof ;  that  it  should  be  so  made  as  to  ensure  com- 
fort; that  the  shaping  and  blocking  and  trimming 
were  merely  matters  of  taste  and  fashion  of  the 
period,  but  that  the  style  of  the  hat  should,  never- 
theless, be  carefully  studied,  as  much  as  possible, 
to  make  the  wearer  look  like  a  gentleman. 

"My  replies  generally  seemed  to  satisfy  the  Count, 
who,  in  conclusion,  said,  smiling,  'You  have 
evidently  made  a  study  of  your  business.  But  you 
have  forgotten,'  he  added,  'that  a  hat  should  be  in 
proportion  to  the  height  of  the  wearer.' 

"I  ventured  to  observe  that  I  could  not  regard 
additional  height  as  an  improvement. 

'"Quite  the  contrary,'  he  observed.  'It  would 
render  monstrous  what  was  before  distinguished. 
But  a  tall  man,  nevertheless,  ought  not  to  wear  a 
low-crowned  hat.  It  is  an  incongruity,  and  renders 
him  conspicuous,  and  that,  as  I  take  it,  is  to  be 
avoided.  Again,  a  short  man  in  a  high  hat  is  out  of 
proportion ;  it  dwarfs  him,  as  long  hair  does  a  lady 
who  is  petite.' 

"Upon  this  I  ventured  the  remark  that  in  such 
cases  exactly  it  was  that  the  eye  of  the  hatter  was 
required,  for  the  wearer  of  a  hat  was  not  always  the 
best  judge  of  the  style  that  best  suited  him. 

"'Some  men  make  their  own  styles,  Mr.  Melton,' 
was  the  Count's  reply,  with  a  gentle  smile.  .  .  . 

"My  interview  with  this  great  leader  of  fashion 
ended  in  my  receiving  orders  that  resulted  in  a 
204 


One  Coat,  One  Hat 

brilliant  success.  No  part  of  the  Count's  personal 
attraction  was  more  studied  by  him  than  his  hat, 
nor  was  it  the  less  noticed  and  admired  by  the 
public.  His  taste  was  marvellous,  and  his  quickness 
of  eye  in  costume  beyond  all  that  can  be  imagined, 
save  by  a  beau  of  the  Brummell  school. 

"As  an  illustration  of  the  fact,  his  hats  varied  in 
dimensions  to  suit  his  coats.  For  his  lighter,  cut-off 
riding-coat  he  wore  his  hat  smaller  in  all  dimensions 
than  for  the  thicker  overcoats,  especially  that  mag- 
nificent sealskin  coat  first  introduced  by  him,  and 
which  now  is  somewhat  general  —  indeed,  has  been 
imitated  even  by  the  ladies  in  their  piquant  winter 
jackets. 

"Need  I  say  that  the  consummate  acuteness  of  this 
idea  of  a  distinct  hat  for  a  particular  coat  left  a 
deep  and  lasting  impression  of  its  importance  on 
myself  ?  Indeed,  the  mere  enunciation  of  it  made 
the  fact  self-evident,  that  a  hat  should  most  assuredly 
suit  the  width  of  shoulders  or  figure  as  much  as 
the  face." 

It  is  hard  to  have  to  omit  Mr.  Melton's  remarks 
on  other  of  his  patrons  —  the  Prince  of  Wales,  of 
whose  tall  hat  a  picture  is  given,  "since  many  of  the 
readers  of  this  brochure  may  be  resident  in  the 
country,  in  foreign  climes,  or  remote  colonies,  and 
may  not  know  the  style"  of  it;  the  Prince  Consort, 
who  was  "a  great  advocate  for  ventilation"  and 
wore  a  modified  "Anglesea";  the  Earl  of  Harrington, 
205 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

whose  test  of  a  hat  was  to  stand  on  it ;  and  even  Sir 
Edwin  Landseer,  who  sent  to  Mr.  Melton  for  a  hat 
of  the  Prince  Consort's  to  insert  in  a  picture,  and 
was  then  so  lost  to  decency  as  to  place  it  in  such  a 
position  that  the  maker's  name  was  not  disclosed. 

I  have  no  room  for  the  expansion  of  these  pas- 
sages ;  for  it  is  the  spectacle  of  Mr.  Melton  as  the 
plain  man  in  relation  to  a  nobleman  that  is  the 
interesting  thing ;  and  to  that  we  now  come.  The 
narrative,  again,  is  Mr.  Melton's.  Nobody  else 
could  have  written  it. 

"Some  time  since  I  received  a  telegraphic  message 
from  the  Earl  of  Stamford  and  Warrington  to  wait 
upon  his  lordship,  who  was  then  at  Bradgate,  his 
family  seat  in  Leicestershire ;  and  with  all  speed, 
following  in  good  order  the  magnetic  compliment  of 
his  lordship's  request,  I  arrived  at  the  nearest  station 
to  Bradgate.  Being  strange  to  the  locality,  my 
mind  was  busily  occupied  in  deliberating  as  to  which 
hotel  I  should  put  up  at,  and  casting  my  eye  along 
the  platform  to  catch  a  porter  whose  countenance 
would  impress  me  favourably  with  the  desired 
recommendation,  my  eye  fell  upon  one  of  his  lord- 
ship's six-feet  footmen,  who,  addressing  me  with 
marked  respect,  said  he  was  there  to  receive  me.  I 
thanked  him,  and  asked  about  the  hotel,  when  he 
said,  'I  have  been  sent  with  a  conveyance  to  take 
you  to  the  house.' 

"At  the  house  I  arrived,  duly  welcomed  by  the 
206 


Half-way  Pew 

butler,  who  paid  me  every  polite  attention.  Orders 
were  given  to  show  me  to  my  bedroom,  where 
having  indulged  in  a  brush  and  my  tortoiseshell,  I 
returned  to  the  reception-room,  and  to  a  glorious 
supper  of  the  good  things  of  Bradgate  House,  to 
which  I  did  ample  justice. 

"On  retiring  to  my  bedroom  a  cheerful  fire  wel- 
comed me  with  that  spirting  of  the  fiery  embers 
which  gives  such  a  joyous  charm  to  the  log.  My 
room,  I  need  hardly  say,  was  elegantly  appointed, 
and  afforded  me  a  princely  repose.  On  rising  the 
next  morning,  I  was  strongly  impressed  with  the  view 
from  my  bedroom  window,  situated  in  the  happiest 
position  for  a  fine  bit  of  park  scenery.  The  day 
was  Sunday,  and  hearing  that  service  would  be 
performed  in  the  house,  I  sent  a  message  to  the 
Earl  to  know  if  I  might  be  permitted  to  attend. 
The  request  was  answered  in  the  true  spirit  of 
amiable  condescension  for  which  the  Earl  is  so  justly 
famed,  and  in  company  with  the  household,  of 
between  thirty  and  forty  domestics,  I  wended  my 
way  into  the  fine  room  in  which  the  service  was 
performed,  and  there  a  seat  was  most  graciously 
placed  for  me  between  the  household  and  the  noble 
Earl  and  his  beautiful  Countess.  I  heard  the  service 
excellently  read  by  the  Rev.  Mr.  Paine,  the  Earl's 
private  chaplain,  who  concluded  it  with  a  very 
admirable  sermon.  A  scene  of  this  character  could 
not  fail  to  be  devoutly  impressive  to  one,  like  myself, 
fresh  from  the  crowded  and  miscellaneous  worship 
207 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

of  a  metropolitan  church  assemblage.  Nor  was  the 
effect  lessened  by  my  walk  (after  a  capital  luncheon) 
through  the  beautiful  scenery  of  Bradgate  Park, 
fraught  as  it  is  with  reminiscences  of  the  ancient 
family  of  the  Ferrers  of  Groby,  and  doubly  famous 
as  the  estate  for  whose  restoration  Elizabeth  Wood- 
ville  knelt  as  a  widow  at  the  'Queen's  Oak'  to 
Edward  IV  after  the  battle  of  Taunton,  and  con- 
quered her  conqueror  so  far  as  to  become  his  queen 
in  the  year  ensuing.  Here,  too,  lived  Lord  Admiral 
Seymour,  who  walked  in  this  park  with  his  wife 
Catherine,  the  fortunate  dowager-queen  of  the  wife- 
killing  Henry  VIII.  And  here,  with  Lord  Dorset, 
her  father,  were  passed  the  few  happy  days  of  the 
Lady  Jane  Grey. 

"My  walk  at  an  end,  I  retired  to  a  dinner  worthy 
of  the  Lord  of  Enville,  and  this  disposed  of,  in  the 
quiet  coolness  of  the  evening,  I  strolled  over,  on  the 
gentle  invitation  of  an  accompanying  cigar,  to  a 
remote  and  romantic  part  of  the  park,  called 
'Anstey.'  Here  I  looked  in  upon  Reeves,  one  of 
the  principal  superintendents  of  his  lordship's  pre- 
serves. I  was  much  charmed  with  the  interesting 
associations  of  the  cottage,  and  more  than  pleased 
with  its  inmates,  who  consisted  of  an  excellent 
mother,  with  a  family  of  well-behaved,  nice  children ; 
while  Reeves  himself  displayed  an  amount  of  intelli- 
gence and  education,  as  well  as  information,  which 
gratified  me  vastly.  He  was  well  up  in  the  subjects 
of  the  day,  and  speaking  sympathizingly  of  the 
208 


The  Mushrooms 

demise  of  the  Prince  Consort,  touched  me  so  keenly 
as  to  prompt  me  on  my  return  to  town  to  send  him 
a  book  which  no  man  should  neglect  to  read,  The 
Speeches  and  Addresses  of  the  late  Prince  Consort; 
a  work,  indeed,  which  I  have,  with  much  pleasure 
to  my  own  feelings,  presented  to  several  of  my 
friends.  .  .  . 

"Another  agreeable  night  took  me  on  to  Monday, 
when  his  lordship  briefly  gave  me  one  of  his  usual 
liberal  orders." 

That  is  the  way  to  treat  a  lord.  Mr.  Melton 
knew  it  exactly.  Sad  to  think  that  the  creation  of  a 
great  number  of  peers  would  impair  this  admirable 
attitude  of  homage.  But  I  fear  that  it  would.  Not 
even  Mr.  Melton,  with  all  his  stores  of  reverence 
and  his  instant  appreciations,  could  be  quite  master 
of  himself  if  the  nobleman  who  invited  him  to  the 
country  —  to  receive  briefly  however  liberal  an  order 
—  had  been  converted  but  yesterday  from  material 
which  he  had  known  in  the  rough. 


II.  —  HELL-FIRE  DICK 

I   have   before  said   that   the   time   is   never   quite 
ripe    to    edit    Lamb,    and    another    proof    of     that 
statement    occurred    last    evening    when    I    brought 
P  209 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

home  the  Rev.  J.  Richardson's  Recollections  of  the 
Last  Half  Century  (1856)  and  came  upon  Mr.  Richard 
Vaughan.  For  it  was  several  years  earlier  that  I  had 
been  in  need  of  that  gentleman,  and  could  not  then 
find  him. 

Writing  to  Sarah  Hutchinson  in  August  1815, 
Mary  Lamb,  in  what  is  perhaps  her  most  charming 
letter,  describes  a  visit  just  paid  by  herself  and  her 
brother  to  Cambridge.  "We  set  off  on  the  outside 
of  the  Cambridge  coach  from  Fetter  Lane  at  eight 
o'clock  and  were  driven  into  Cambridge  in  great 
triumph  by  Hell-Fire  Dick  five  minutes  before  three." 
To  these  words,  when  preparing  my  edition  of  the 
letters,  I  could  put  no  illuminating  commentary ; 
but  now  I  know  Dick  well.  Richard  Vaughan,  or 
Hell-Fire  Dick,  after  losing  his  licence  as  the 
landlord  of  the  Bell  at  Cambridge,  owing  to  the 
effects  of  his  popularity  among  the  undergraduates, 
returned  to  driving,  and  tooled  the  up  "Telegraph" 
from  the  Sun  in  Trump tington  Street  half-way  to 
London,  and  brought  the  down  "Telegraph"  back 
every  afternoon.  He  was  a  very  horsey-looking  man, 
"bony,  gaunt,  and  grim,"  and  his  complexion  was 
"indicative  of  continual  exposure  to  the  winds  and 
the  weather  and  to  habitual  indulgence  in  what 
is  taken  to  keep  the  weather  out."  When  not 
driving  he  was  a  sportsman  of  varied  interests,  of 
which  cock-fighting  was  chief;  he  instructed  the 
young  bloods  in  driving ;  and  he  possessed  a  rough 
and  ready  wit  which  found  its  way  into  the  world 
210 


Struwwelpeter 

from  the  box  of  the  "Telegraph"  by  the  medium  of  a 
voice  which  a  boatswain  in  a  storm  would  envy. 

Such    was    the    coachman    who    deposited    Charles 
and  Mary  Lamb  in  Cambridge  in  August  1815. 


III.  —  AN  OUTRAGE 

The  question,  Can  a  translation  be  a  classic  ? 
would  receive  an  affirmative  reply,  I  take  it,  on 
FitzGerald's  Omar  alone,  fortified,  if  needful,  by 
Shelton's  Don  Quixote,  Florio's  Montaigne,  Jowett's 
Plato,  and  Jebb's  Sophocles.  Yet  why  climb  so 
high  ?  A  classic,  after  all,  is  a  classic,  whether  of 
the  slopes  or  the  peak  of  Parnassus  —  whether  for 
the  young  or  the  mature  - —  and  the  question  is  as 
satisfactorily  answered  by  naming  the  original 
English  version  of  Struwwelpeter  as  any  more  pre- 
tentious work.  Who  made  this  translation  (in  the 
middle  of  the  last  century)  that  small  Victorians 
might  develop  worthily  into  full-grown  moral 
Edwardians  and  respectable  grey-haired  Georgians  I 
know  not;  nor  can  I  examine  into  its  closeness  to  the 
German  original.  Neither  name  nor  fidelity  matters. 
What  does  matter  is  that  the  text  was  established ; 
it  became  Scripture ;  it  was  done  for  all  time. 
Babel  was  again  defeated ;  a  German  book  rooted 
in  the  very  soil  that  nourished  the  roof-trees  of  the 

211 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

land  had  become  an  English  book  rooted  in  the 
very  soil  that  nourished  our  roof -trees  too.  The 
wear  and  tear  of  life  sadly  impair  the  memory,  but 
few  middle-aged  and  older  persons  in  whose  nursery 
Shock-headed  Peter  held  sway  would  be  unable  to 
cap  most  of  the  verses  in  it  still. 

Here  is  cruel  Frederick,  see  ! 
A  horrid  wicked  boy  was  he  ; 

He  kill'd  the  birds,  and  broke  the  chairs, 
He  threw  the  kitten  down  the  stairs, 
And,  oh  !   far   worse  than  all  beside, 
He  whipp'd  his  Mary  till  she  cried. 

What  old  Peterite  could  fail,  on  hearing  those  lines, 
to  call  up  the  picture,  or,  seeing  the  picture,  could 
fail  to  recollect  something,  at  any  rate,  of  the  lines  ? 
The  work  has  passed  into  the  national  consciousness ; 
it  is  on  the  canon.  Who  can  ever  forget  the  story 
of  Harriet,  the  matches,  and  the  cats  ?  And  sup- 
pose the  question  were  asked,  What  was  the  name 
of  the  magician  with  the  giant  ink-pot?  the 
answer  would  be,  of  course,  "  Agrippa  —  tall  Agrippa." 
And  if  the  question  were,  What  was  the  name 
of  little  Suck-a-Thumb  ?  the  answer  would  be 
"Conrad";  or  of  his  corrector?  "The  great  long 
red-legg'd  Scissor  man."  It  is  such  familiarity  as 
this  which  makes  classics,  and  Struwwelpeter  stands 
high  among  them. 

What,  then,  is  to  be  said  of  anyone  who,  with  all 
this  weight  of  tradition  accumulating  through  sixty 
212 


Debased  Coin 

years  at  least,  shall  set  out  to  translate  Struwwelpeter 
afresh,  retaining  its  pictures,  but  changing  the  text? 
Not  changing  it  much,  but  sufficiently  to  baffle  the 
ear  in  every  line.  How  characterize  him  ?  For 
there  lies  before  me  a  book  to  all  appearance  the 
real  thing.  That  is  to  say,  it  has  a  pasteboard  cover 
of  the  right  size,  and  it  is  called  Struwwelpeter,  and 
Shock-headed  Peter  straddles  upon  it.  But  within  ? 
Let  me  swiftly  indicate  the  quality  of  this  pretender 
to  the  throne.  You  remember  the  last  four  lines  of 
the  verse  beneath  Peter  himself :  — 

And  the  sloven,  I  declare, 
Never  once  has  comb'd  his  hair ; 
Anything  to  me  is  sweeter 
Than  to  see  Shock-headed  Peter. 

Not  very  wonderful  lines,  maybe,  but  the  lines  that 
we  have  known  and  rejoiced  in  for  half  a  century. 
Listen  to  the  impostor  :  — 

Now  the  boys  who  Peter  meet 
Loudly  shout  from  street  to  street, 
"Get  your  nails  cut !     Look,  there's  hair  !" 
And  the  girls  all  rudely  stare. 

The  slang  phrase  is  introduced  in  order,  one  must 
suppose,  the  better  to  recommend  it  to  the  juvenile 
taste  of  the  day.  Is  that  the  way  ?  In  the  story 
of  the  Green  Huntsman  there  are  many  slips  and 
a  steady  inferiority.  Thus,  in  the  authorized  version, 

The  poor  man's  wife  was  drinking  up 
Her  coffee  in  her  coffee  cup. 

213 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

In  the  revised  version, 

There  in  the  window  from  a  cup 
The  huntsman's  wife  drank  coffee  up, 

—  although  the  artist  drew  her  not  at  the  window 
but  at  the  door.  The  sex  of  the  hare's  child  is 
changed  in  the  new  version. 

But  worse  is  to  come.  Conrad  is  now  "Jimmy," 
and  the  Scissor  man  is  merely  "the  tailor."  The 
famous  couplet,  so  swift  and  tragic, 

Mamma  had  scarcely  turned  her  back, 
The  thumb  was  in,  Alack  !  Alack  ! 

is  watered  down  to 

Mother's  gone,  she  spoke  in  vain, 
Gugg  !   the  thumbs  are  sucked  again  ; 

while  the  abysmal  complacency  of  the  original  end 
goes  completely.  In  our  memories  are  these  lines 
engraven  — 

Mamma  comes  home ;     there  Conrad  stands 
And  looks  quite  sad  and  shows  his  hands ; 
"Ah  !"  said  Mamma,  "I  knew  he'd  come 
To  naughty  little  Suck-a-Thumb." 

The  new  version  has  it  — 

When  Mamma  returns  she  sees 
Jimmy  sad  and  ill  at  ease. 
There  he  stands  without  his  thumbs ; 
This  of  disobedience  comes  ! 

That   is   to   say,   we   lost   the   character   of   Mamma 
214 


Mrs.  Thornton 

altogether  —  she  is  eliminated.  Augustus,  who  would 
not  eat  his  soup  — 

Augustus  was  a  chubby  lad  — 
is  now  Tommy  — 

Young  Tommy  healthy  was  and  fat ; 

and  Johnny  Head  in  Air  becomes  Sky-gazing  Jack ; 
although  Flying  Robert  (the  first  modern  aviator)  is 
allowed  to  be  Robert  still.  But  I  close  the  pitiful 
indictment  here.  In  every  poem  are  changes,  and 
all  are  for  the  worse.  Yet  the  quality  of  the  change 
is  immaterial;  it  is  the  fact  of  change  at  all  that  is 
wrong.  A  few  things  are  sacred  still. 

Seldom  does  one  want  one's  fourpence  back ;    but 
this  is  a  case. 


IV.  —  MRS.  THORNTON 

In  The  Sportsman's  Vocal  Cabinet,  edited  by  Charles 
Armiger  in  1831,  is  a  description  of  the  great 
race  between  Mrs.  Thornton  on  Colonel  Thornton's 
Vingarillo  and  Mr.  Flint  on  Thornville,  at  York, 
on  August  25th,  1804.  The  race  was  four  miles,  for 
500  guineas  and  1000  bye,  and  100,000  persons 
assembled  on  Knavesmire  to  witness  it,  or  ten 
times  more  than  had  assembled  to  see  either 
Eclipse  or  Bay  Mai  ton,  those  famous  fliers.  As 
2XS 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

much  as  £200,000  depended  on  the  race,  and  at 
starting  the  betting  was  5  to  4  and  even  6  to  4  on 
the  lady,  and  at  the  end  of  the  third  mile  7  to  4  and 
2  to  1.  But  Mr.  Flint  then  took  the  lead  and  won, 
Mrs.  Thornton  drawing  up,  "in  a  sportsmanlike 
style,"  before  the  post.  Her  backers  were  thus 
depressed,  "but  the  spirit  she  displayed  and  the 
good  humour  with  which  she  bore  her  loss  were 
so  remarkable"  —  I  quote  from  the  York  Herald  — 
"  as  greatly  to  diminish  the  joy  of  many  of  the 
winners."  Isn't  that  pretty  and  impossible?  The 
gallant  Yorkshiremen ! 

"Never,  surely,"  writes  the  reporter,  —  "never, 
surely,  did  a  woman  ride  in  better  style.  It  was  diffi- 
cult to  say  whether  her  horsemanship,  her  dress,  or 
her  beauty  were  most  admired  —  the  tout  ensemble 
was  unique.  Mrs.  Thornton's  dress  was  a  leopard- 
coloured  body,  with  blue  sleeves,  the  rest  buff,  and 
blue  cap." 

But  what  of  the  Vocal  Cabinet?  for  this,  you 
say,  is  all  prose.  Well,  a  poet  made  a  song  on  the 
race  which  was  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  vic- 
torious Mr.  Flint,  addressing  his  competitor.  Here 
are  some  of  its  stanzas,  in  the  same  key  of  gallantry 
as  that  of  the  York  Herald's  article  and  the 
Knavesmire  gamblers :  — 

I  denied  you  a  friend  to  ride  by,  I  confess, 
And  for  why  ?  —  not  for  sake. of  the  pelf ; 

But  I  wished  to  enjoy,  in  a  case  of  such  bliss, 
All  that  pleasure  and  honour  myself. 

2l6 


A  Close  Finish 

Four-fifths  of  the  race,  you  must  candidly  own, 
You  had  the  "whip  hand,"  while  behind 

I  humbly  pursued,  till  your  nag  "was  broke  down"  — 
Then  before  you  to  go,  sure,  was  kind. 

But,  believe,  to  the  fair  I  am  warmly  inclined  — 

To  be  always  polite  I  am  ready  : 
Tho'  my  horse  was  so  rude  as  to  leave  you  behind, 

I  will  ne'er  run  away  from  a  lady. 

Mrs.  Thornton's  next  race,  on  which  the  Colonel, 
her  husband,  had  a  bet  of  four  hogsheads  of  coti 
roti  and  2000  guineas,  and  herself  a  bet  of  600 
guineas,  fell  through;  but  a  little  later  she  was 
again  matched,  this  time  with  Frank  Buckle.  Mrs- 
Thornton  rode  Louisa,  by  Pegasus  and  Nelly.  Buckle 
rode  Allegro,  also  by  Pegasus  and  Allegranti's  dam. 
Mrs.  Thornton  carried  9  st.  6  lb.,  and  Buckle  3  st. 
more.  Mrs.  Thornton  was  habited  in  a  purple  cap 
and  waistcoat,  long  nankeen  skirts,  purple  shoes, 
and  embroidered  stockings.  The  race  was  two 
miles,  and  Mrs.  Thornton,  with  the  greatest  skill 
and  judgment,  won  it  by  half  a  neck.  Half  a  neck 
in  two  miles  suggests  that  perhaps  Mr.  Buckle  was 
a  gallant  too ;  but  the  stewards  of  the  Jockey  Club 
seem  to  have  instituted  no  inquiries. 

Colonel  Thornton,  I  find,  was  Thomas  Thornton, 
of  Thornville  Royal,  Yorkshire,  son  of  a  soldier  of 
the  '45  and  M.P.  for  York.  He  was  born  in  1757, 
educated  at  the  Charterhouse  and  Glasgow  Univer- 
sity, and  on  his  father's  death  he  gave  up  the  Army 
and  took  to  sport,  not  only  hunting  and  shooting, 
217 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

but  writing  about  those  pursuits.  In  1802  he  and  his 
first  wife  —  the  lady  of  the  saddle  —  visited  France, 
and  met  Napoleon,  to  whom  the  Colonel  presented  a 
pair  of  pistols,  and  in  1806  A  Sporting  Tour  in 
France  was  published,  being  the  Colonel's  letters 
to  the  Earl  of  Darlington,  describing  his  adventures. 
France  attracted  him  so  much  that  after  Waterloo 
he  settled  there,  and  called  himself  Prince  de 
Chambord  and  Marquis  de  Pont.  By  this  time, 
however,  the  riding  Mrs.  Thornton  had  passed  away, 
and  the  Colonel  had  married  again.  His  portrait  by 
Reinagle  is  in  the  appropriate  ownership  of  Lord 
Rosebery,  and  hangs  at  The  Durdans. 

But  it  is  the  first  Mrs.  Thornton  who  interests 
me,  and  I  should  like  to  know  more  of  her ;  but 
The  Dictionary  of  National  Biography  cannot  even 
record  her  maiden  name.  Why  do  not  women 
ride  races  to-day  ?  one  wonders.  They  do  every- 
thing else. 


V.  —  CARLYLE'S  PROVOCATION 

The  Taylor's  Complete  Guide;  or,  a  Comprehensive 
Analysis  of  Beauty  and  Elegance  in  Dress,  a  slender 
work  published  in  1796,  claims  to  do  away  for  ever 
with  badly  fitting  and  unintelligent  clothes.  "That 
all  the  world  may  be  improved,"  say  the  authors, 
218 


Rhetorical  Snips 

who  describe  themselves  as  a  "Society  of  Adepts," 
"and  human  nature  receive  its  pristine  grace  and 
elegance,  is  the  principal  object  of  our  ambition ; 
and  by  administering  to  the  general  good,  and  con- 
ferring an  obligation  upon  industrious  individuals, 
our  ultimate  end  will  be  answered." 

This  means,  of  course,  that  they  were  sartorial 
artists.  Merely  to  cover  nakedness  was  not  their 
line  of  country  for  a  moment ;  but  rather  to  drape 
with  grace  and  elegance  the  human  form,  male  or 
female,  but  preferably  male.  And  not  only  artists 
but  philosophers.  Note  how  nicely  the  Adepts  steer 
their  barque  through  this  passage  :  — 

"...  the  Eye  will  soon  discriminate  between 
Grace  and  Affectation,  between  the  Elegant  Contour 
and  Dress  of  a  complete  Gentleman  and  the  extrav- 
agant whimsies  of  a  City  Fop  —  these  are  great 
considerations  in  the  article  of  Dress,  the  former 
being  the  result  of  Grace,  Sensibility,  and  refined 
experience,  the  latter  the  extravagance  of  folly, 
under  the  sanction  of  the  Whim  of  Fashion ;  though 
we  would  have  all  our  Brothers  of  the  Trade  under- 
stand us  right,  in  this  great  particular;  although 
we  may  in  these  sheets  have  occasion  to  criminate 
the  Luxury  of  the  Whim,  to  shew  what  is  opposite 
to  Grace  and  Elegance,  we  by  no  means  dis- 
countenance the  Votaries  of  Fashion ;  for  we  are 
well  convinced  of  its  Use  and  Benefits.  The  novelty 
of  Fashion  is  the  Nursery  of  Trade,  the  propagator 
of  the  Arts,  and  Field  of  great  Employment." 
219 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

Fashion  must,  however,  be  subordinated  to  the 
genius  of  the  artist :  — 

"It  matters  not  whether  narrow  or  broad  Backs 
are  the  Rage  of  Fashion,  stand-up  or  turn-down 
Collars,  short  or  long  Waists,  or  whatever  turn  the 
cut  of  the  Skirts  may  take,  the  ultimate  end  is 
to  cut  and  fit  well,  taking  care  to  harmonize  the 
prevalence  of  the  Whim,  by  assimilating  the  Parts 
with  Prudence  and  Ease,  having  the  following 
Maxim  in  view,  That  the  very  Pride  of  Elegance  is 
collective  neatness." 

The  ground  being  thus  cleared,  the  Adepts  come 
to  business  with  Section  I,  Chapter  I,  "Of  the 
Theory  and  Practice  of  Breeches."  Here  they  tell 
how  to  measure  customers,  and  particularly  —  for  the 
others  are  comparatively  simple  —  how  to  measure 
those  customers  with  whose  figure  "Nature  has  a 
little  sported."  Section  II  brings  us  to  waistcoats, 
but  again  the  ground  must  be  cleared,  this  time  by 
a  series  of  remarks  about  the  cliques  that  make 
civil  war  in  the  taylors'  kingdom. 

"We  write  for  the  general  good,  and  are  conscious 
of  meeting  success  in  the  minds  and  sentiments  of 
the  truly  liberal ;  and  doubt  not  that  thousands  now 
living  (who  are  humble  in  their  pretensions)  will 
rejoice  at  the  opportunity  of  having  such  an  easy 
access  to  the  secret  purlieus  of  the  business,  which 
neither  time  nor  application  could  accomplish  to  their 
certainty  and  satisfaction.  The  envious  asseverations 

220 


Rhetorical  Snips 

of  rancorous  disappointed  Men  are  beneath  the  notice 
of  true  and  genuine  criticism. 

"Candour  is  the  source  of  true  genius,  and  will 
never  disparage  the  fruitful  efforts  of  any  art;  what- 
ever is  contrary  to  this  is  generally  directed  by 
spleen  and  scurrility,  and  has  nothing  to  support  it 
but  envy  and  malice.  Such  ill-nature  we  despise, 
being  too  trivial  for  serious  consideration  as  mean 
as  calumny  itself,  the  source  and  offspring  of  spite 
and  ignorance.  Having  said  so  much,  we  will  pro- 
ceed to  the  manner  of  measuring  the  Waistcoats." 

"We  mean  not  by  this,"  say  the  authors,  after 
some  remarks  on  coats  and  elegance,  "  to  infringe 
upon  the  distinguishing  qualities  in  the  making  of 

a  gentleman  of  either  the  or  the ?"  Who 

can  guess  what  those  other  allies  in  the  great 
enterprise  of  gentleman-making  are  ?  Who  can  fill 
those  blanks?  But  you'll  never  do  it:  "either  the 
fencing  master  or  the  dancing  master."  How 
completely  things  have  changed  ?  There  is  no 
longer  the  slightest  need  for  a  gentleman  to  have 
recourse  to  any  one  of  the  trio.  He  can  get  along 
in  a  ready-made  suit,  dance  no  steps,  and  never 
handle  a  foil. 

And  now  the  Adepts  come  to  the  ladies  and  to 
some  charming  courtesies.  The  drawing-room  voice 
sibilates  throughout  the  section.  They  say  :  — 

"The  great  veneration  we  have  for  the  Ladies 
makes  us  a  little  cautious  how  we  arraign  the  incon- 

221 


sistency    of     the     prevailing     rage    and    fashion     of 
making  Habits." 

Then  they  add  :  — 

"As  nature  has  been  so  delicately  graceful  in  the 
formation  of  the  Ladies,  would  it  not  be  more  con- 
sistent with  reason  and  elegance,  if  dresses  were 
made  coincident  with  nature,  to  display  the  beauti- 
ful appearance  of  their  charming  features  ?  Fashion 
hath  as  many  changes  as  variety,  and  all  within 
the  pale  of  symmetry  and  gentility ;  the  Ladies  have 
no  occasion  to  rack  their  fancies  with  preposterous 
distortions ;  the  whole  arcanum  of  extravagance 
is  totally  dissimilar  an.d  foreign  to  graceful  elegance 
and  ease." 

One  puts  the  work  down,  regretting  that 
journalese  has  become  the  universal  language  of  our 
time.  Journalese  has  no  character  at  all ;  it  is 
merely  commercially  useful.  A  taylor  who  should 
write  of  his  art  to-day  like  that  would  not  get  a 
customer,  except  out  of  curiosity  to  see  an  ass.  But 
isn't  it  a  nice  book,  and  cannot  one  easily  imagine 
Carlyle  throwing  it  aside  in  order  to  begin 
Sartor? 


VI.  —  Two  INVITATIONS 

The  literature  of  hospitality,  so  far  as  I  know,  has 
never   been    studied    by    the    anthologist ;     but   it   is 

222 


Hospitality 

worth  it.  There  would,  however,  be  a  terrible  em- 
barrassment of  riches,  for  it  is  a  branch  of  writing 
in  which  every  warm-hearted  person  can  excel, 
while  there  is  also  an  immense  deal  of  the  very  best. 
In  fact  it  is  impossible  to  take  up  any  man's  Life 
and  letters  without  coming  upon  certainly  one 
invitation  that  extends  two  hands  very  alluringly, 
while  when  the  man  is  of  the  large,  generous  habit 
of  a  Scott  or  a  Dickens,  not  only  fond  of  his  friends, 
but  proud  (and  pardonably  so)  of  his  Abbotsford  or 
his  Gad's  Hill,  the  unexpected  product  of  his  own 
unassisted  genius,  why  then  we  get  something  very 
fine  indeed.  But,  as  I  said,  the  literature  of  hos- 
pitality is  within  the  reach  of  every  one  with  a 
hearth  and  a  sense  of  sodality,  and  you  and  I  have 
probably  written  quite  as  good  invitations  —  at  any 
rate  for  a  line  or  so  —  as  Horace,  or  Pliny,  or  Victor 
Radnor  himself,  because  the  impulse  has  been 
equally  true  and  the  friendliness  equally  cordial. 

The  first  printed  invitation  to  attract  my  notice 
occurred  in  one  of  Jacob  Abbott's  Franconia  books. 
It  was  in  rhyme,  and  the  lines,  which  have  never  left 
my  memory,  are  these  :  — 

Come  as  early  as  you  can, 
And  stay  till  after  tea. 

I  read  those  first  —  or  heard  them  read  —  about  forty 
years  ago.  And  yesterday  I  found  in  an  odd  volume 
of  the  Derbyshire  Archaeological  Society's  collections 
my  latest  example  of  printed  invitation  —  the  letter 
which  has,  indeed,  suggested  these  remarks.  It  was 
223 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

written  by  Sir  John  Statham,  of  Wigwell,  to  the 
Hon.  Charles  Stanhope,  of  Elvaston,  who  must  have 
been  a  very  delightful  guest  wherever  he  went, 
judging  by  the  figure  he  cuts  in  Walpole's  letters 
(Walpole  could  write  an  invitation  too  !)  and  in  Sir 
Charles  Hanbury-Williams's  pleasant  light  verse. 
But  the  invitation  is  attractive  not  only  for  the 
genuineness  of  its  writer's  desire  to  have  Stanhope 
at  ease  under  his  roof,  but  for  its  description  of  an 
English  country  house  on  broad  lines  in  the  middle 
of  the  eighteenth  century. 

Here  it  is,  just  as  it  was  written,  country-house 
spelling  and  all;  the  date  is  probably  about 
1740-50 :  - 

"DEAR  SIR,  —  I  was  uneasy  to  leave  you,  but  night 
at  hand,  I  almost  overtook  Sir  N.  I  did  not  drive 
up  to  him,  but  went  straite  home.  I  begun  to  con- 
sider how  to  engage  you  to  come  hither.  If  I  cu'd 
form  a  delicious  place  by  poetical  description  I  wu'd 
do  it  to  intice  you,  but  I'll  give  you  a  plain  natural 
description,  &  then  you'll  not  be  deceived,  since 
youve  seen  into  nature  as  far  as  any  man.  This  was 
the  cheif  seate  of  the  great  Abbot  of  Darleigh;  I 
stand  in  clear  air  in  the  region  of  Health,  am  not 
confined,  for  am  above  7  miles  in  circumference, 
a  Mannr  without  one  foot  of  any  one's  interfering. 
In  that  district  is  all  the  convenience  of  life,  Wood, 
Coal,  Corn  of  all  sorts,  Park  Venison,  a  Warren  for 
Rabbits,  Fish,  Fowl,  in  the  uttermost  perfection, 
224 


The  Joys  of  Wigwell 

exempted  from  all  Jurisdiction,  no  Bishops,  Priests, 
Proctra,  Apparatora,  or  any  such  last  mentioned 
Vermine  can  breath  here. 

"Our  way  of  life  here  is,  Every  one  does  that  wh. 
is  right  in  his  own  eyes,  go  to  bed,  sit  up,  rise  early, 
lie  late,  all  easy,  only  we  are  confined  to  meet  at 
breakfast,  and  then  order  by  agreem*  what's  for 
dinner ;  the  pastures  are  loaded  with  good  Beif  & 
Mutton,  the  dove-coats  with  pidgeons,  the  Mews 
with  partridges,  the  Canals  and  Steues  with  excellent 
fish,  and  the  barne  doores  with  the  finest  white, 
plump  Phesant  fowles,  out  of  those  you  order  your 
dayly  entertainm  .  After  this,  if  you're  for  shooting, 
Moor  game,  partridges,  Wild  Ducks,  &c  at  door ;  if 
exercise,  a  good  bowling  green  &  many  long  walks ; 
is  reading,  a  library ;  if  walking,  a  dry  Park,  with  a 
delicious  nut  wood,  full  of  singing  birds,  turtles  and 
Guinea  hens,  a  delicate  Eccho,  where  musick  sounds 
charmingly.  In  it  are  labarinths,  statues,  arbors, 
springs,  grottos  &  mossy  banks,  in  the  mittls  a  large 
clear  fish  Pond  with  a  draw  bridge  and  Close  Arbor, 
in  the  water  a  Cellar  for  choice  liquor,  &  the  whole 
stow'd  full  of  nimphs  kind  &  obliging  without  art  or 
designe  more  than  Love  for  Love. 

"There's  about  30  families  in  the  liberty,  &  in 
every  house  you  may  discerne  some  good  blood.  If 
retirement  be  irksome,  on  notice  to  Wirksworth 
theres  loose  hands,  Gentlemen,  Clergymen,  &c  ever 
ready  at  any  hour  &  stay  just  as  long  as  you'd  have 
'em  and  no  longer  &  easy  to  be  told  so.  This  is 
Q  225 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

really  a  genuine  and  true  description  <,f  this  place  & 
way  of  life  if  you'l  come  and  try  it  &  use  it  as  your 
own,  as  the  master  is  intirely  yors.  I  do  think 
you'd  say  as  the  first  Duke  of  D.  sd,  the  3  days 
he  was  yearly  lost  in  Need  wood  forest,  those  were 
the  only  days  wherein  he  tasted  life.  If  rainy 
weather  confines  you,  I  have  a  library  &  the  famous 
Chimist  Mr  Harris  to  amuse  you  with  experiments 
&  a  Playwright  author  of  some  Comedies  to  divert 
you.  And  as  I  know  you  rather  delight  in  giving 
life  than  taking  it  away  your  visit  would  give  new 
life  yo  Dr  S  yr  most  &c.  J.  S." 

After  reading  that,  I  turned  once  again  to  the 
gentle,  affectionate  lines  of  a  simpler  and  later  host 
—  A.  C.  Dick,  the  Scottish  lawyer  —  to  his  friend, 
Dr.  John  Brown,  a  hundred  and  more  years  after. 
How  different  is  the  manner  !  — - 


O  speed  your  coining  !  —  Though  its  charms  be  few, 

The  place  will  please  you,  and  may  profit  too ; 

My  house,  upon  the  hillside  built,  looks  down 

On  a  neat  harbour  and  a  lively  town. 

Apart,  'mid  screen  of  trees,  it  stands,  just  where 

We  see  the  popular  bustle,  but  not  share. 

Full  in  our  front  is  spread  a  varied  scene  — 

A  royal  ruin,  grey  or  clothed  with  green, 

Church  spires,  tower,  docks,  streets,  terraces,  and  trees, 

Backed  by  green  fields,  which  mount  by  due  degrees 

Into  brown  uplands,  stretching  high  away 

To  where,  by  silent  tarns,  the  wild  deer  stray. 

Below,  with  gentle  tide,  the  Atlantic  sea 

Laves  the  curved  beach,  and  fills  the  cheerful  quay .... 

226 


Alluring  Couplets 


Lo  !  that*  high  officer,  big  Kate  the  cook, 
With  brow  all  puckered,  and  most  studious  look ; 
She  strictly  meditates  your  table  fare  — 
Hence  her  staid  gait,  and  hence  her  anxious  air. 
Provident  soul !  already  she  has  bound, 
In  solemn  treaty,  half  the  country  round, 
The  best  of  barns,  byres,  shops,  and  stands,  and  stalls, 
TO  answer  prompt  her  culinary  calls : 
New  milk,  fresh  butter,  tender  fowls,  fresh  eggs  — 
Beef,  mutton,  veal,  in  chops,  steaks,  loins,  and  legs, 
Saddles  and  breasts  —  with  fish  of  fin  and  shell, 
Hams,  tongues,  game,  venison,  more  than  I  can  tell ; 
Besides,  whate'er  the  grocery  or  the  field, 
Of  spice,  preserves,  sauce,  roots,  fruits,  stocks  may  yield  — 
All  are  bespoke.  —  With  these,  and  with  her  skill, 
Native,  or  learned  from  Soyer's  Oracle, 
She  waits  the  day  —  all  hopeful  she  may  share 
A  festal  triumph  —  lolling  on  your  chair, 
(While  from  the  table  Mary  bears  away 
The  ruined  feast)  may  hear  you  loudly  say, 
With  smacks  emphatic  —  "I  have  dined  to-day  !  "  .  .  . 

And  I  myself  have  looked  into  a  bin 
Of  glass-bound  brandy,  whiskey,  rum,  and  gin : 
Of  these,  and  those,  different,  though  like  in  shape, 
Dear  prisoned  spirits  of  th'  impassioned  grape, 
Have  noted  which  for  you  to  disenthral, 
And  some  fresh  claret  bought  to  crown  the  festival. 

Here  we  have  two  kinds  of  host  very  clearly 
portrayed  —  the  ostentatious  and  the  modest.  But 
both  wanted  their  guest,  and  that  after  all  is  the 
main  thing. 


227 


The  Fourpenny  Box 


VII.  —  TRIFLING  WITH  THE  DOCTOR 

To  find  a  new  parody  of  Dr.  Johnson  is  not 
easy ;  but  I  have  done  so.  It  is  in  an  odd  volume 
of  The  Wit's  Foundling  Hospital  —  an  exercise  in  the 
Hebridean  manner  describing  the  great  lexicographer 
in  Ireland  (where  he  never  was). 

The  author  was  Robert  Jephson,  born  in  1736,  a 
Dublin  wit  and  the  friend  in  London  of  Johnson, 
Goldsmith,  Garrick,  Reynolds,  and  Horace  Walpole. 
On  becoming  Master  of  the  Horse  to  Viscount 
Townshend,  then  Lord  Lieutenant,  Jephson  returned 
to  Dublin  and  took  to  squibs  and  plays.  His  chief 
drama  was  Braganza,  produced  at  Drury  Lane  in 
1775,  and  his  adaptation  of  The  Castle  of  Otranto 
was  successful  too.  He  sat  in  the  Irish  Parliament, 
and  died  in  1803. 

Colonel  Marlay,  who  cuts  such  a  grotesque  figure 
in  the  narrative,  is  more  like  one  of  the  curious 
Irishmen  of  whom  Amory  wrote  in  that  strange, 
wilful  book,  John  Buncle,  but  I  feel  sure  he  would  be 
found  to  be  real  enough  and  that  the  whole  purpose 
of  the  parody  was  to  make  him,  more  than  anyone, 
laugh.  Dean  Marlay,  his  brother,  was  the  uncle  of 
Henry  Grattan,  and  after  being  Dean  of  Ferns  be- 
came Bishop  of  Waterford.  He  knew  Johnson  well, 
belonged  to  the  Literary  Club,  and  was  famous  for 
his  humour.  It  was  he  who,  when  his  coachman 
was  asked  to  get  some  water  from  the  well  and 
228 


A  Good  Parody 

refused  on  the  grounds  that  his  business  was  to 
drive  and  not  run  errands,  told  him  to  put  the 
pitcher  in  the  carriage  and  drive  for  the  water; 
which  he  did  several  times :  a  pleasantry  quite  in 
the  manner  of  Swift.  The  father  of  the  Marlays 
was  the  Chief  Justice  of  Ireland. 

Now  for  the  parody,  which  describes  a  day's  excur- 
sion from  Dublin  to  Celbridge,  the  home  of  Colonel 
Marlay,  his  companions  being  two  ladies  (one  of 
them  Mrs.  Jephson)  and  the  Dean.  Here  is  a  good 
passage :  — 

"Though  we  passed  with  a  rapid  velocity  over 
little  more  than  three  leagues  of  high  road  to 
Celbridge,  I  observed  many  stately  mansions,  many 
well-disposed  enclosures,  and  more  towering  planta- 
tions than  any  eye  but  that  of  a  native  of  Scotland 
could  discover  in  the  black  circumference  of  the 
whole  Caledonian  horizon.  The  pleasure  I  received 
from  the  transient  contemplation  of  such  scenes 
was  often  interrupted  by  the  sight  of  tattered 
mendicants,  who  crawled  from  their  hamlets  of  mud 
on  the  wayside  to  howl  for  charity  or  to  gaze  in  torpid 
suspension  at  the  ordinary  phenomenon  of  a  passing 
equipage.  National  reflections  are  always  illiberal, 
and  often  ill  founded ;  the  poverty  of  the  lower 
class  of  people  in  Ireland  is  generally  imputed  to 
laziness,  but  sagacity  will  not  rest  satisfied  with 
such  a  solution,  especially  when  it  is  considered 
that  the  risque  of  a  halter  is  intuitively  preferable 
229 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

to  the  certainty  of  famine,  and  that  the  rags  of 
these  miserable  bipeds  might  be  mended  with  less 
trouble  than  they  are  worn,  and  in  a  shorter  time 
than,  jf  they  are  shaken  off,  they  can  again  be 
indued." 

The  carriage  being  overset  by  pigs  —  while  the 
party  were  engaged  in  song,  passing  from  anthems 
to  the  Beggar's  Opera  —  the  Doctor  had  an  oppor- 
tunity of  conversing  with  a  wayside  innkeeper,  who 
thus  described  his  prospective  host :  — 

"  The  Colonel,  he  told  me,  had  long  served  in 
the  Army  with  great  reputation,  and  had  quitted  it 
in  some  disgust,  or  to  have  more  leisure  for  the 
business  of  agriculture,  in  which  he  takes  great 
delight  and  is  very  skilful.  His  clothing  was  of 
goats'  skins,  fastened  together  with  leather  thongs, 
and  girt  round  the  middle  by  a  sash,  which  he  had 
worn  in  all  the  late  wars.  Since  his  retirement  he 
had  never  shaved  his  beard,  which  hung  below  his 
waist,  and  was  quite  white,  though  his  age  was  but 
little  on  the  dusky  side  of  fifty.  His  love  of  seques- 
tration being  generally  known,  his  gate  was  seldom 
besieged  with  idle  visitors,  and  many  were  deterred 
from  approaching  it  by  fear  of  a  twelve-pounder 
planted  at  the  orifice  of  a  side  wall,  commanding 
the  entrance  to  the  mansion ;  this  piece  of  ordnance, 
being  loaded  up  to  the  muzzle  with  boiled  potatoes, 
spontaneously  discharged  its  vegetable  ammunition 
230 


Colonel  Marlay 

in    the    faces    of    all    who    laid    hold  of  his   knocker 
without  business  or  invitation." 

Upon  meeting  the  Colonel,  the  Doctor  found  that 
he  had  been  somewhat  misinformed.  But  I  must 
quote :  — 

"By  comparing  the  authenticity  of  ocular  knowl- 
edge with  the  fallaciousness  of  legendary  rumour, 
conviction  will  at  last  find  her  sober  medium  between 
the  dangerous  austerity  of  heterodox  rejection  and 
the  despicable  acquiescence  of  passive  credulity. 
The  beard  excepted,  which  hung  thick,  long,  and 
albescent  below  his  breast,  there  was  no  circumstance 
of  singularity  in  the  Colonel's  appearance.  He  wore 
his  hair  in  the  military  fashion,  tied  behind  with  a 
ribbon ;  a  bright  garnet-coloured  cloth,  ornamented 
with  a  well-fancied  brass  button,  was  his  superior 
tegument ;  over  a  tunick  of  silk  proper  for  the 
solstitial  season,  and  elegantly  wrought  in  the 
tambour  with  variegated  embroidery  of  flowers  and 
foliage ;  from  below  the  genual  articulation  to  the 
sucated  division  of  the  body  he  was  covered  with 
flesh-coloured  Indian  linen  of  a  tenuity  almost 
transparent,  through  which  the  contour  of  femoral 
rotundity  filled  the  eye  with  a  satisfactory  plump- 
ness." 

The  scenery  of  Celbridge  gave  the  Doctor  much 
satisfaction :  so  much  so  that  he  became  senti- 
mental :  — 

231 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

"The  lively  sallies  of  my  companions  of  the  way, 
poignant  without  malice,  and  frolicksome  without 
fatuity,  had  occasioned  some  paroxysms  of  hilarity, 
that  bordered  upon  turbulence,  but  these  spasms  of 
the  mind  were  immediately  tranquillised  by  the 
placidness  of  the  scene  before  me.  I  felt  pleasure 
without  irritation,  and  in  the  sedateness  of  content- 
ment, lost  all  appetite  for  the  delirium  of  extasy. 
I  could  not,  indeed,  forbear  laying  hold  of  the  fair 
hand  of  one  of  the  ladies,  and  crying  out  with  the 
enamoured  Gallus, 

Hie  gelidi  fontes,  hie  mollia  prata  Lycoris : 
His  nemus  :  hie  ipso  tecum  consumerer  sevo. 

My  Lycoris,  seeming  to  conceive  the  full  force  of 
this  passionate  distich,  with  an  amiable  subrision  of 
countenance,  led  me  forward  to  a  spot  at  no  great 
distance,  called  the  island." 

This  island,  in  the  Liffey,  belonged  once  to  Mrs. 
Vanhomrigh,  Swift's  Vanessa.  Johnson  says  :  — 

"Whether  it  was  mentioned  to  me  seriously  by 
Dean  Marlay,  or  was  only  the  extemporaneous 
effusion  of  female  pleasantry,  I  cannot  now  precisely 
determine,  but  I  think  I  heard  that  Vanessa,  when 
mistress  of  Celbridge,  had  put  down  a  laurel  for  a 
very  brilliant  couplet,  of  which  Doctor  Swift  for  her 
own  vanity  told  her  she  was  the  subject  and  he  the 
author.  Had  the  subsequent  possessors  of  Celbridge, 
with  counteractive  industry,  deracinated  a  laurel  for 
232 


The  Saviour  Cow 

every  distich  published  by  his  posthumous  editors, 
disgraceful  to  the  memory  of  that  singular  genius, 
the  island  of  Celbridge  would  be  destitute  of  a 
laurel." 

While  pondering  on  the  island,  the  narrator  fell 
into  the  Liffey,  and  would  have  been  drowned  but 
for  retaining  his  presence  of  mind  until  a  cow 
chanced  to  pass  him  on  its  way  to  the  other  shore. 
Johnson  tells  us  that  he 

"laid  hold  on  that  part  of  the  animal  which  is  loosely 
pendent  behind,  and  is  formed  by  a  continuation  of 
the  vertebrae;  in  this  manner  I  was  safely  conveyed 
to  a  fordable  passage,  not  without  some  delectation 
from  the  sense  of  progress  without  effort  on  my  part, 
and  the  exhilarating  approximation  of  more  than 
problematical  deliverance.  ...  As  the  cutaneous 
contact  of  irrigated  garments  is  neither  pleasant  nor 
salubrious,  I  was  easily  persuaded  by  the  ladies  to 
divest  myself  of  mine;  Colonel  Marlay  obligingly 
accommodated  me  with  a  loose  covering  of  camblet; 
I  found  it  commodious  and  more  agreeable  than 
the  many  compressive  ligatures  of  modern  drapery. 
That  there  might  be  no  violation  of  decorum,  I 
took  care  to  have  the  loose  robe  fastened  close 
before  with  small  cylindrical  wires,  which  the  dainty 
fingers  of  the  ladies  easily  removed  from  their  own 
dress,  and  inserted  into  mine  at  such  proper  intervals 
as  to  leave  no  aperture  that  could  awaken  the  suscep- 

233 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

tibility  of  temperament,  or  provoke  the  cachinnations 
of  levity." 

So  ends  this  jeu  d'esprit,  which  must  have  given 
great  delight  to  certain  Dublin  readers  "in  the 
know."  But  who  really  made  the  journey,  and 
why  it  added  to  the  joke  to  make  him  write  like 
the  great  lexicographer,  I  suppose  we  may  never 
discover.  Meanwhile  of  Colonel  Marlay  one  wishes 
to  hear  more. 


VIII.  —  FRIENDS 

"I  picked  up  to-day,"  said  the  Doctor,  "a  curious 
old  book  of  travels  and  anecdotes,  in  which  the  writer 
develops  the  theory  that  'twenty  good  acquaintances 
are  the  change  for  a  friend ' ;  that  is  to  say,  that  one 
is  as  well  off  with  twenty  silver  shillings  as  a  golden 
pound.  The  analogy  will  not  of  course  hold  good, 
because  you  can  do  exactly  the  same  with  twenty 
shillings  as  with  a  sovereign,  whereas  you  cannot  do 
the  same  with  twenty  acquaintances  as  with  one 
friend,  since  they  are  not  friends." 

"It  depends,"  said  A.,  "on  what  one  wants.  In 
health  and  prosperity  twenty  acquaintances  might 
be  more  amusing  and  companionable  than  a  friend ; 
but  in  illness  or  adversity  they  would  certainly  be 
disappointing,  and  they  might  be  a  nuisance." 

"How  would  you  define  a  friend?"  B.  asked. 
234 


Definitions 

"I  should  define  him,"  said  A.,  "as  one  who 
although  he  knows  your  bad  side  still  likes  you." 

"And  whom,  although  you  know  his  bad  side, 
you  still  like  ?" 

"Of  course.     As  I  like  you." 

"Well,  in  that  case,"  said  B.,  "I  don't  see  how 
one  can  talk  of  acquaintances  making  up  for  him  at 
all.  He  is  too  different,  too  distinct." 

"It's  a  good  word,"  said  C.,  "it's  a  pity  to  abuse 
it.  Rival  counsel  who  refer  scathingly  to  their 
'learned  friend'  make  me  furious." 

"What  was  your  idea  of  a  friend,  Doctor?" 
asked  B. 

"I  don't  think  I  had  thought,"  he  answered.  "I 
suppose  in  a  vague  way  I  knew  it  was  one  to  whom 
one  could  give  oneself  away  safely." 

"Not  a  bad  definition,"  said  C.,  "would  be:  one 
who  comes  in  reply  to  telegrams." 

"Yes,"  said  D.,  "or  one  who  can  be  counted  upon 
to  stay  behind  and  pay  the  waiter." 

"Tell  us  more  about  your  book,"  said  A. 

"It  is  by  a  Frenchman,"  said  the  Doctor,  "  who 
wrote  between  1775  and  1805.  A  diplomatist.  A 
kind  of  moral  Casanova,  moving  from  Court  to  Court 
gathering  anecdotes  instead  of  victims.  He  knew 
every  one  —  from  the  great  Chatham  to  Voltaire 
Amusing  anecdotes  of  highwaymen  have  always 
been  attractive  to  me.  Here  is  one,  of  a  certain 
artist  in  that  genre  named  Boulter,  who  was  hanged 
in  1778 :  - 

235 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

"It  was  said  of  him,  among  other  things,  that  one 
day  riding  on  horseback  on  the  high-road,  he  met  a 
young  woman  who  was  weeping,  and  who  appeared 
to  be  in  great  distress.  Touched  with  compassion, 
he  asked  what  was  the  cause  of  her  affliction;  when 
she  told  him,  without  knowing  who  he  was,  that  a 
creditor,  attended  by  a  bailiff,  had  gone  to  a  house 
which  she  pointed  out,  and  had  threatened  to -take 
her  husband  to  prison  for  a  debt  of  thirty  guineas. 
Boulter  gave  her  the  thirty  guineas,  telling  her  to 
go  and  pay  the  debt,  and  set  her  husband  at  liberty ; 
she  ran  off,  loading  the  honest  gentleman  with  her 
benedictions.  Boulter,  in  the  meantime,  waited  on 
the  road  till  he  saw  the  creditor  come  out,  he  then 
attacked  him  and  took  back  the  thirty  guineas, 
besides  everything  else  that  he  had  about  him." 

"Such  a  proceeding,"  said  the  Doctor,  "must  put 
the  celestial  Bench  in  a  serious  dilemma.  The  man 
had  been  good  to  the  poor  girl;  that  should  count 
in  his  favour.  But  he  had  robbed ;  that  should 
count  against  him.  But  his  booty  was  his  own  loan ; 
that  was  not  far  removed  from  justice.  But  he  took 
everything  else  too;  that  was  robbery,  no  doubt. 
All  the  same,  the  drying  of  the  poor  girl's  tears  has 
to  count.  'I  have  known,'  the  traveller  continues, 
'many  persons  who  have  been  robbed  in  England. 
All  agree  in  doing  justice  to  the  respectful  behaviour 
which  these  robbers  showed  to  those  whom  they  put 
under  contribution.' 

236 


Mrs.  Yates 

"His  meeting  with  a  famous  actress  of  that  day 
was  amusing.  It  was  in  Paris,  and  he  had  gone 
alone  to  the  theatre  :  — 

"I  seated  myself  in  one  of  the  boxes,  which  was 
rather  dark ;  there  was  nobody  in  it  but  a  lady  and 
her  daughter,  and  a  man  whom  I  took  for  the 
husband.  They  were  conversing  in  English,  and 
were  making  their  remarks  upon  the  actors.  The 
lady  asked  me  some  questions  in  bad  French,  and  I 
answered  her  in  English.  She  seemed  delighted  at 
being  able  to  converse  in  her  own  language,  and 
begged  me  to  tell  the  names  of  all  the  actors 
and  actresses  who  were  in  the  piece.  We  also  talked 
about  the  English  theatre.  She  asked  me  what  I 
thought  of  Garrick,  Mrs.  Gibber,  and  Mrs.  Pritchard ; 
I  told  her  I  thought  them  excellent,  and  gave  her 
my  reasons.  ^ 

"She  approved  of  my  judgment,  and  asked  me 
also  what  I  thought  of  Mrs.  Yates.  As  for  her,  I 
told  her,  I  thought  her  only  a  middling  performer. 

'  'What  are  her  defects  ?' 

''She  wants  mind;  she  mistakes  one  passion  for 
another;  she  is  in  a  rage  when  she  should  be 
weeping.' 

'  'Is  it  long  since  you  saw  her  ?' 

"  'I  saw  her  last  Tuesday  in  Zara.' 

'  'But  tell  me  another  instance.' 

"I  mentioned  two  or  three. 

'  'And  how  should  those  parts  be  performed?' 

237 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

'  '  I  cannot  tell :  I  am  no  actor ;  but  we  may  be 
able  to  perceive  a  part  is  not  well  performed  without 
being  able  to  play  it  properly  oneself.' 

"Perceiving,  however,  the  warmth  with  which 
the  lady  defended  Mrs.  Yates,  I  was  desirous  of 
recanting,  or  at  least  softening  the  severity  of  my 
criticism ;  but  she  reminded  me  of  what  I  had  said 
before,  and  I  endeavoured  to  justify  my  assertions. 
By  this  time  the  husband  had  joined  us;  and  both 
the  young  lady  and  he  paid  the  greatest  attention 
to  the  conversation,  but  did  not  take  any  part 
in  it. 

"At  last,  the  play  concluded,  I  gave  my  hand  to 
the  lady  to  assist  her  out  of  the  box,  and,  as  I  took 
leave  of  her,  I  looked  at  her  by  the  light,  and  per- 
ceived that  it  was  Mrs.  Yates  herself  that  I  had 
been  all  the  time  talking  to.  I  did  not  let  them  see 
that  I  knew  her,  but  retired. 

"  She  had  told  me  that  she  lodged  at  the  Hotel 
de  Tours :  I  went  thither  the  next  morning,  and 
inquired  what  English  persons  lodged  there :  and 
found  them  to  be  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Yates  and  their 
daughter.  They,  as  well  as  myself,  had  left  London 
on  Wednesday,  and  had  arrived  in  Paris  on 
Sunday.  .  .  . 

"I  afterwards  learnt  that  she  took  pleasure  in 
relating  this  anecdote  herself,  saying  that  she  had 
never  received  so  good  a  lesson.  This  was  in  the 
year  1766,  and  I  have  been  since  assured  that  she 
greatly  profited  by  it." 

238 


Neapolitan  Manners 

"This  incident,"  said  the  Doctor,  "deserves  a 
place  in  any  collection  of  such  meetings,  which  are 
always  productive  of  humour,  and  usually,  in  time, 
of  profit.  A  better  story  is  told  of  the  light  con- 
science of  the  Neapolitan  Smart  Set  of  that 
day :  — 

"A  young  English  nobleman  was  introduced  at 
an  assembly  of  one  of  the  first  ladies  of  Naples,  by 
a  Neapolitan  gentleman.  While  he  was  there  his 
snuff-box  was  stolen  from  him.  The  next  day,  being 
at  another  house,  he  saw  a  person  taking  snuff  out 
of  this  very  box. 

"He  ran  to  his  friend.  'There,'  said  he,  'that 
man  in  blue,  with  gold  embroidery,  is  taking  snuff 
out  of  the  box  which  was  stolen  from  me  yesterday. 
Do  you  know  him  ?  Is  not  he  a  sharper  ? ' 

'Take  care,'   said   the  other,   'that  is  a  man  of 
the  first  quality.' 

"  'I  do  not  care  for  his  quality,'  said  the  English- 
man; 'I  must  have  my  snuff-box  again  !  I'll  go  and 
ask  him  for  it.' 

"  'Pray,'  said  his  friend,  'be  quiet,  and  leave  it  to 
me  to  get  back  your  box.' 

"Upon  this  assurance  the  Englishman  went 
away,  after  inviting  his  friend  to  dine  with  him  the 
next  day. 

"He  accordingly  came;  and,  as  he  entered, 
'There,'  said  he,  'I  have  brought  you  your 
snuff-box.' 

239 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

'  'Well,'  said  the  Englishman,  'how  did  you 
obtain  it  ? ' 

'  '  Why,'  said  the  Neapolitan  nobleman,  '  I  did 
not  wish  to  make  any  noise  about  it,  therefore  I 
picked  his  pocket  of  it.' " 

"Very  good,"  said  B.,  "I  like  that.  It  pairs  off 
with  the  story  of  Charles  II  and  the  pickpocket." 

"How  much  did  your  find  cost  ?"  said  A. 

"Fourpence  a  volume,"  said  the  Doctor;  "no  old 
book  ought  to  be  more." 


IX.  —  AN  AID  TO  CIRCULATION 

It  is  from  the  past  that  the  wise  man  draws  his 
lessons ;  and  I  have  pleasure  in  reminding  the 
modern  editor  who  is  not  satisfied  with  the  number 
of  bis  subscribers  of  a  device  invented  by  one  of  his 
ancient  predecessors.  There  lies  before  me  an  odd 
volume  of  the  Lady's  Magazine;  or,  Entertaining 
Companion  for  the  Fair  Sex,  appropriated  solely  to  their 
Use  and  Amusement.  The  year  is  1788,  and  it  is 
stated  roundly  that  the  elegant  frontispiece  is 
"designed  and  engraved  by  the  most  capital  artists 
in  Europe."  The  magazine  is  much  as  one  would 
expect  it  to  be  —  a  miscellany  of  descriptive  articles, 
short  stories  (very  mysterious  or  intense),  artificial 
240 


The  Young  Ladies 

letters  on  manners  and  morals,  letters  to  the  editor 
on  questions  of  etiquette,  Eastern  tales  (then  very 
popular),  poetry,  largely  in  the  manner  of  Miss 
Seward,  and  a  budget  of  news  of  the  month. 
Each  number  also  has  a  new  pattern  and  a  new 
song. 

All  this  is  conventional ;  the  novelty  —  the  trick 
to  gain  circulation  —  is  the  inclusion  every  month  of 
"enigmatical  questions,"  or  lists  of  names  of  well- 
known  residents  in  certain  of  the  chief  centres  of 
England.  Thus—  "Enigmatical  List  of  Young 
Ladies  in  Durham";  "Enigmatical  List  of  Beauties 
in  the  Isle  of  Wight";  "Enigmatical  List  of  Young 
Gentlemen  of  Scarborough";  "Enigmatical  List  of 
Bachelors  in  the  Neighbourhood  of  Wolverley, 
Shropshire";  "Enigmatical  List  of  the  Names  of 
some  of  the  Officers  of  the  Warwickshire  Militia." 
Sometimes  one  finds  the  references  almost  too  local, 
as  in  the  "Enigmatical  List  of  Young  Ladies  at 
Miss  Cowperthwaite's  Boarding-School,  Ipswich"; 
but  Ipswich  boarding-schools  seem  to  be  favoured, 
for  among  the  poetry  I  find  this  somewhat  daring 
epigram :  — 

"Addressed    to    Miss  C s,    at    Miss    Harrison's 

Boarding-School,  Ipswich,  on  the  author's  first 
seeing  her  at  church  — 

"  O  C s,  thou  enchanting  fair  ! 

Hast  play'd  the  robber's  part ! 
Thou  lately  stole  from  heav'n  a  prayer, 
And  likewise  stole  my  heart." 

R  241 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

You  note  the  peculiar  charm  of  the  thing  —  every 
one  involved  is  unmarried,  and  there  is  not  a  little 
excitement  in  the  guessing.  Can  you  not  see  the 
Young  Ladies  of  Durham  poring  over  the  list,  and 
their  delight  on  finding  their  own  names,  and  their 
dismay  at  being  left  out  ?  And  the  beauties  of  the 
Isle  of  Wight  —  even  worse  to  be  left  out  of  that 
galaxy  ! 

And  now  let  us  see  how  it  was  done.  Here  is  a 
good  example :  — 

"AN   ENIGMATICAL   LIST   OF   YOUNG   LADIES   OF 
MALDON,    ESSEX 

"1.  The  wife  of  an  ancient  patriarch  and  a  sweet 
flower. 

"2.  Three-sevenths  of  a  title,  one-third  of  a  term 
of  affirmation,  and  four-ninths  of  the  distance  from 
east  to  west. 

"3.  A  Queen  of  England  and  a  fish,  changing  a 
vowel. 

"4.  The  Christian  name  of  an  unfortunate  con- 
cubine, two-fifths  of  an  ancient  British  priest,  two- 
fifths  of  a  month,  and  two-fifths  of  a  mistake. 

"5.  A  female  Sovereign,  three-sevenths  of  the 
High  Priest  of  Rome,  and  one-sixth  of  a  short 
sword. 

"6.  Three-fifths  of  to  make  void,  three-sixths  of 
a  man's  Christian  name,  two-thirds  of  solid  water, 
and  one-fourth  of  a  salute. 

"7.  The  mother  of  a  prophet,  a  heap  of  corn. 
242 


Flattering  Enigmas 

two-sixths  of  a  pointed  weapon,  and  one-fourth  of 
the  smallest  quantity  of  any  liquor. 

"8.  Three-sixths  of  a  well-known  fish,  two-fourths 
of  a  musical  instrument,  and  a  large  and  small 
stream. 

"9.  The  mother  and  daughter  of  a  King,  two- 
eighths  of  a  northern  constellation,  the  sharp  part  of 
an  instrument,  and  one-third  of  an  animal." 

I  must  confess  that  many  of  these  are  too  difficult 
for  me ;  I  don't  hold  with  such  an  atomic  theory  in 
puzzles.  But  there  are  doubtless  readers  with  the 
special  acrostic  gift  to  whom  these  problems  will 
present  little  or  no  difficulty.  However,  here  is  the 
official  solution,  printed  two  or  three  months  later :  — 

"1.  Sarah  May. 

2.  Mary  Long. 

3.  Mary  Hurring. 

4.  Jane  Draper. 

5.  Elizabeth  Pond. 

6.  Ann  Edwick. 

7.  Hannah  Rickard. 

8.  Sally  Seabrook. 

9.  Mary  Pledger." 

How  many  of  these  belles  of  Maldon  in  1788 
have  left  any  memory,  one  wonders  ?  Where  are 
the  neiges  d'antan?  Such  lists  accentuate  (if  that  is 
possible)  one's  already  too  profound  sense  of  transi- 
toriness. 

243 


X.  —  A  PHRASE 

From  far  Japan  comes  this  little  Guide  on  Hakone, 
written  in  English  as  well  as  he  can  by  C.  J. 
Tsuchiya,  and  one  of  its  phrases  is  so  admirable 
that  it  should  be  put  on  record  for  inferior  English 
scholars  to  imitate.  Hakone,  it  should  be.  premised, 
is  a  village  of  thermal  springs  situate  on  the  top 
of  Hakone  Mountain.  The  mountain  was  once  a 
volcano,  "but  lately  its  activity  became  quite 
absent."  The  natural  disposition  of  the  villagers  of 
Hakone  is  "gentle  and  honest,"  and  "their  mutual 
friendship  is  so  harmonious  as  that  of  a  family." 
The  village  is  famous  for  its  fresh  air;  "during  the 
winter  days  the  coldness  robs  up  all  pleasures  from 
our  hands,  but  at  the  summer  months  they  are  set  free." 

But  now  for  the  shining  phrase.  Hakone  was 
the  scene,  thirty -odd  years  ago,  of  a  decisive  battle 
which  gave  feudalism  its  death-blow.  The  two 
contestants  were  the  Lord  of  Odawara-Han,  of  the 
Imperial  Army,  and  the  Lord  of  Boshu,  who  stood 
for  feudalism.  For  a  while  the  Lord  Boshu  con- 
quered, and  he  drove  the  enemy  to  the  castle  of 
Odawara,  where  they  made  themselves  secure.  He 
then  advanced  upon  them,  feeling  certain  of  victory. 
But  he  had  calculated  badly,  or,  in  Mr.  C.  J. 
Tsuchiya's  delightful  words,  "he  missed  unexpect- 
edly his  cogitation,"  with  the  result  that  the  foe 
rushed  out  suddenly  and  defeated  him. 
244 


Italian  without  Tears 

Let  us  all  take  example  from  the  Lord  of  Boshu 
and  endeavour,  when  we  have  a  cogitation,  to  hit 
the  truth  with  it. 


XI.  —  SATURNINITY 

Collections  of  funny  stories  are  depressing  things, 
but  there  is  a  little  more  to  be  said  for  them  when 
they  illustrate  a  nation's  humour.  Hence  when  I 
was  asked  fourpence  the  other  day  for  The  Amusing 
Instructor,  being  a  Collection  of  Fine  Sayings,  Smart 
Repartees,  &c.,  from  the  most  approved  Italian  Authors, 
with  an  English  Translation  (London,  1727),  I  decided 
to  make  the  plunge,  especially  as  I  had  just  read 
in  a  review  a  sentence  from  Mr.  Justin  Huntly 
McCarthy's  novel  The  O'Flynn  to  the  effect  that 
"economise"  was  a  dirty  verb  to  use  to  a  gentleman. 

According  to  the  Preface,  the  book  was  designed 
for  the  use  of  those  desirous  of  learning  the  Italian, 
the  ordinary  study  of  language  being  "very  dry  and 
unpleasant."  For  how,  the  compiler  inquires,  in 
effect,  can  anyone  be  bored  who  learns  a  new  tongue 
from  waggish  anecdotes  ?  Well,  that  was  before 
the  days  when  railway  reading  had  to  be  invented ; 
he  would  not  adopt  such  a  method  or  such  confidence 
now.  Some  of  his  stories,  however,  are  not  bad ; 

245 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

and  the  best  have  a  certain  family  resemblance,  an 
agreeable  saturninity  being  at  the  bottom  of  them. 
I  string  together  a  few  examples  :  — 

"  The  True  Method  for  Recollecting  Ones  Faxt 
Sins.  —  A  man  confessing  himself  to  a  priest,  among 
other  sins  of  which  he  own'd  himself  guilty,  said, 
that  he  had  beat  his  wife  a  few  hours  before.  The 
father  confessor  asking  him  the  occasion  of  it,  he 
reply'd,  that  'twas  his  usual  custom,  because  his 
memory  was  so  very  weak,  that  he  cou'd  not  re- 
member the  sins  he  had  committed ;  but  whenever 
he  had  drubb'd  his  wife,  she  reproach'd  him  with  all 
the  ill  he  had  done  in  his  life,  and  that  thereby  he 
was  enabled  with  very  little  trouble  to  make  a 
general  confession." 

That  is  very  typical  of  the  humour  of  the  old 
story-tellers.  It  has  two  certain  elements  of  success 
in  it  —  a  wife  in  her  right  place,  and  blows. 

We  find  the  wife  again  in  the  next ;  but  it  has  an 
unexpected  turn :  — 

"A  Man  at  Messina  was  accus'd  for  marrying  five 
wives,  when,  being  carried  before  the  judge,  he  was 
ask'd,  why  he  had  married  so  many;  he  answer'd,  in 
order  to  meet  with  one  good  one  if  possible,  and 
afterwards  keep  to  her.  Oh  !  says  the  judge,  if  you 
cannot  meet  with  a  good  one  in  this  world,  get  you 
gone  into  the  next  and  look  for  one  there ;  upon 
which  he  order'd  him  to  be  put  to  death." 

The   next   example   introduces   avarice,   which   was 

246 


The  Debtor's  Bed 

also  a  very  favourite  topic  with  humorists,  but  seems 
now  to  have  gone  out.  At  least,  one  rarely  meets 
the  miser  in  modern  fiction,  but  then  neither  does 
one  meet  anyone  else  with  marked  characteristics. 
They  are  having  a  close  time.  The  pendulum, 
however,  will  swing  back  some  day,  preoccupation 
with  the  Seventh  Commandment  will  cease,  and  the 
misers  and  other  picturesque  oddities  will  return. 
Here  is  the  story  :  — 

"A  Roman  knight  was  found  after  his  death  to 
owe  above  five  hundred  thousand  ducats,  which 
circumstance  he,  when  alive,  had  very  industriously 
conceal'd.  When  they  afterwards  came  to  sell  his 
possessions,  and  among  other  things  his  furniture, 
Augustus  Caesar  gave  orders  that  they  shou'd 
purchase  his  blankets  for  himself,  saying,  that  he 
wou'd  use  them,  in  order  to  make  him  sleep,  since 
he  who  had  been  so  much  in  debt,  had  been  able  to 
sleep  under  them." 

The  following  story  also  follows  familiar  lines,  but 
is  very  well  done  here  :  — 

"A  man  who  was  at  the  point  of  death  left 
orders  by  his  Will  to  his  only  son,  that  he  should 
sell  three  faulcons  of  great  value ;  ordering  by  the 
same,  that  by  the  sale  of  one  he  should  pay  his 
debts;  that  the  money  arising  from  the  sale  of  the 
other  should  be  employed  for  the  good  of  his  soul ; 
and  that  the  third  should  be  sold  for  his  own 
247 


The  Fourpenny  Box 

advantage.  His  father  dying  a  few  days  after,  one 
of  the  faulcons  flew  away,  which  he  could  not  catch 
again,  upon  which  he  cry'd  out;  that  goes  for  my 
father's  soul." 

Even  better  I  like  this,  which  contains  an  extraor- 
dinary amount  of  philosophy  to  the  square  inch :  — 

"Trespade  Mantuano  fearing  a  threshing  about 
from  one  of  his  enemies,  stood  upon  his  guard  for 
upwards  of  a  twelve-month ;  but  happening  to  be 
watch'd  one  evening,  his  shoulders  were  handsomely 
drubb'd ;  at  which  he,  far  from  discovering  the  least 
discontent,  but,  as  if  he  had  been  eas'd  of  some 
burthen,  crys  out,  thank  heavens,  that  I  have  got 
rid  of  this  ugly  affair." 

There  has  been  nothing  quite  English  in  anything 
I  have  quoted  yet,  but  we  find  the  cynical  humour 
of  the  London  streets  in  the  following,  which  again 
introduces  the  wife,  this  time  a  Xantippe.  All 
nations  (and  Londoners  are  a  separate  nation) 
probably  join  hands  in  such  sarcasms :  — 

"A  Perugian  was  bewailing  himself,  and  crying 
bitterly,  because  his  wife  had  hang'd  herself  on  one 
of  his  fig-trees,  Upon  which  a  friend  of  his  drawing 
near  him,  whispers  him  in  the  ear,  'How  is  it  possible, 
my  friend,  that  you  can  find  tears  to  weep  in  so  much 
prosperity  ?  Pray  give  me  a  slip  of  that  fig-tree, 
because  I  have  a  mind  to  plant  it  in  my  garden,  to 
see  what  my  wife  will  do.'  " 
248 


The  Height  of  Grimness 

But  the  next,  the  most  tremendous  cynicism  of  all, 
is  unique.  That  is  beyond  London  completely ;  nor 
do  I  know  of  anything  of  the  kind  among  French 
ana.  If  it  is  like  anything,  it  is  like  some  grim 
Hindoo  jest :  — 

"A  Vine-dresser  or  husband-man,  going  to  his 
master,  told  him  the  news  of  his  wife's  being 
brought  to  bed;  and  what  has  she  got,  replies  the 
master,  a  girl  I  warrant  you  ?  Better,  Sir,  replies 
the  husband-man.  Has  she  a  boy  then?  continues 
the  master.  Better  still,  replies  the  husband-man, 
for  she's  brought  to  bed  of  a  dead  female  child." 


249 


The  Worst  Prelude  to  Adventure     <^x      -o 

LONDON  is  never  so  exciting  as  on  May  nights. 
The  other  evening  I  was  forced  into  attending 
a  debate :  a  thing  I  had  not  done  for  years.  Never 
mind  what  the  subject  was,  but  one  speaker  after 
another  got  up  —  a  few  in  reply  to  the  last  speaker, 
but  most  merely  to  deliver  some  remarks  prepared 
even  earlier  (if  possible)  than  the  last  speaker  had 
prepared  his.  And  so  it  went  on,  and  then  there 
was  a  show  of  hands,  something  was  carried,  some- 
thing was  lost ;  and  I  found  myself  under  the  May 
stars  with  the  sweetness  of  the  May  night  all 
about  me. 

It  was  not  very  late;  I  was  in  no  hurry  to  go  to 
bed ;  and  the  evening's  rhetoric,  so  futile,  when  all 
is  said,  because  only  academic  and  leading  no  whither, 
had  aroused  in  me  a  mood  of  revolt.  To  think  that 
we  should  have  been  sitting  there  arguing  in  a  stuffy 
room,  when  we  might  have  been  high  on  Hampstead 
Heath ;  or  in  the  garden  of  the  Spaniards ;  or 
smelling  the  lilacs  of  Holland  Walk ;  or,  at  ease,  on 
the  crazy  green  balcony  of  the  Angel  at  Rotherhithe, 
250 


Books 

watching  the  river  lights  and  the  stealthy  nocturnal 
shipping.  Or  we  might  have  been  merely  in 
London's  streets  under  the  May  stars. 

It  infuriated  me.  "I  have  lost  an  evening,"  I 
said,  "and  a  May  evening  at  that;  and  life  is  so 
devilish  short."  And  so  saying  I  pulled  myself 
together  and  added,  "But  no  matter  —  here  you  are, 
with  a  latchkey  and  an  open  mind :  have  an  adven- 
ture !" 

It  was  then  about  a  quarter-past  eleven.  At  one 
o'clock  I  was  nearing  home,  weary  and  disheartened, 
asking  myself  the  question,  "Who  are  the  people 
who  have  adventures?"  and  answering  it,  "Those 
who  cannot  appreciate  them."  And  then  I  asked, 
"How  is  it  that  I,  spoiling  for  an  adventure,  have 
had  none?"  and  the  answer  was,  "For  two  reasons 
—  one,  your  attitude  of  receptivity :  it  is  the  un- 
expected that  happens ;  and,  two,  only  an  ass  would 
ever  expect  an  adventure."  '  And  then  I  asked, 
"This  being  so,  why  on  earth  did  I  ever  prepare  the 
way  for  an  adventure  at  all  ?  Why  didn't  I  know  that 
they  didn't  occur?"  And  the  answer  was,  "Books." 

The  answer  was,  "Books." 

It  is  books  that  do  the  mischief.  Without  books 
we  should  know  life  for  the  humdrum  thing  and 
mposture  it  is,  even  in  London  on  a  May  night. 
And  even  as  it  is,  we  know  it;  but  books  make  us 
forget  what  we  know.  Books  are  in  our  blood.  No 
one  who  begins  bookishly  ever  becomes  quite  free 
again.  There  they  are,  all  the  time,  in  the  back- 

251 


The  Worst  Prelude  to  Adventure 

ground,  dominating  conduct  and  providing  standards, 
ideals,  limitations,  but  above  all  illusions  and  dis- 
appointments. For  the  books  that  one  reads  in 
the  impressionable  years,  and  therefore  absorbs  and 
remembers,  are  always  so  much  better  and  more 
exciting  than  life. 

Ballantyne,  for  example,  who  came  first  —  what 
chances  his  boys  had  that  were  never  ours  !  Coral 
islands  to  be  cast  away  upon ;  fur-trading ;  gorilla- 
hunting  —  you  see  the  mischief  of  it  all !  Then 
Haggard,  Stevenson,  Defoe,  Scott,  Dickens.  These 
are  the  corrupters  of  youth.  One  comes  away  from 
them  for  ever  expecting  something,  where  one 
might,  without  them,  have  been  merely  acquiescent 
and  at  peace.  For  they  all  heighten;  they  all 
arrange  life  their  own  way  and  sauce  it.  Dickens 
comes  nearest  to  the  life  that  one  knows:  one 
continually  meets  characters  with  a  vague  Dickensian 
flavour;  but  the  breath  of  genius  is  not  in  them. 
They  are  the  shells  only :  the  great,  comic,  humane, 
living,  unreal  fairy-land  spirit  has  not  animated 
them.  It  never  can :  it  began  with  Dickens  and 
passed  with  him.  Disappointment  again  ! 

But  on  my  way  home  that  night  it  was  Stevenson 
whom  I  felt  to  be  the  first  of  the  traitors :  Stevenson, 
who  brought  Bagdad  to  London  (the  low  trick !), 
and,  since  Bagdad  is  not  really  London,  spoiled 
life  for  thousands  of  us.  How  often  have  I  invented 
New  Arabian  Nights  for  myself  !  I  suppose  all  that 
ever  tasted  that  seductive  poison  have  done  so. 
252 


Vain  Dreams 

The  taxi  chauffeur  who  invites  one  to  ride  free  to 
the  mysterious  house.  The  anonymous,  agonized 
gentleman  who  stops  me  in  the  street  imploring  me 
to  witness  his  will  or  perform  some  other  service,  to 
be  followed  not  long  after  by  the  receipt  of  the 
lawyer's  letter  (always  a  lawyer's  letter !)  that  carries 
the  news  of  fortune.  The  note  dropped  from  the 
barred  upper  window  behind  which  the  beautiful 
girl  is  incarcerated.  The  veiled  lady  with  the  blood- 
hound. .  .  . 

On  a  May  night  of  stars  in  London  how  one  can 
play  with,  elaborate,  and  perfect  such  motifs.  In 
the  adventure  of  the  agonized  gentleman  who 
requires  a  signature,  for  example,  he  stands  at  the 
gate  in  the  small  hours,  counting  the  infrequent 
passers-by,  his  object  being  to  invite  the  seventh. 
Perhaps  it  is  not  himself  for  whom  he  is  acting,  but 
for  some  strange  sinister  employer,  bed-ridden,  at 
death's  door,  upstairs.  An  old  woman,  maybe, 
masterful,  cunning,  but  helpless,  who  cannot  spare 
this  factotum,  but  must  have  a  life-and-death 
message  carried  at  once.  It  is  I  who  carry  it. 
Perhaps  it  is  written ;  perhaps  it  is  verbal ;  curious 
cryptic  words  which,  when  I  say  them  to  the  person 
they  are  intended  for,  cause  him  to  blanch  and  quail. 
Every  one  has  these  dreams  of  romantic  interludes  in 
the  drab  monotony  of  city -life ;  but  they  come  to 
nothing.  Adventures,  such  as  they  are,  fall  only  to 
those  who  have  forgotten  the  story-writers  or  never 
knew  them. 

253 


The  Worst  Prelude  to  Adventure 

As  to  how  similar  the  ideas  of  exceedingly  dis- 
similar persons  can  be,  even  when  they  are  deliber- 
ately fantastic,  I  have  an  instance  only  too  pat.  It 
has  long  been  a  favourite  whim  of  mine  that  a 
mirror  should  be  invented  capable  of  retaining  every 
reflection  it  had  ever  recorded  and  giving  them 
back  when  desired.  A  little  while  ago  I  picked 
up  Passages  from  the  American  Note-Books  of 
Nathaniel  Hawthorne,  and  found  the  same  idea 
jotted  down  for  use  one  day  in  a  romance.  This 
book,  by  the  way,  is  a  mine  of  suggestions  for  the 
story-writers,  for  Hawthorne  had  more  thoughts  in 
a  day  than  he  could  use  in  a  year;  and  many  of 
them  are  here. 

And  so,  turning  the  key,  I  bade  farewell  to  the 
May  stars,  and  did  one  of  the  most  adventurous 
things  left  to  us  —  I  went  to  bed.  For  no  one  can 
lay  a  hand  on  our  dreams.  All  the  authors  of  the 
world  cannot  spoil  those. 


254 


Note          ^v        <^y        ^^y        <i,        «o        *cy 

THE  essays  that  make  up  this  book  have  for  the 
most  part  already  appeared  in  various  periodi- 
cals —  chiefly  in  Punch,  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  and 
the  Guardian.  But  few  of  them  are  printed  here 
exactly  as  they  were  written,  and  several  have  many 
changes. 

E.  V.  L. 


255 


rPHE  following  pages  contain  advertisements 
of  Macmillan  books  by  the  same  author 


TWO  NEW  BOOKS   BY  MR.    LUCAS 

London  Lavender 

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Mr.  Lucas  has  given  us  a  particularly  beautiful  story  in  "  London 
Lavender."  We  meet  again  several  of  the  fine  characters  with  whom 
Mr.  Lucas  has  already  made  us  acquainted  in  his  other  novels,  as  well 
as  others  equally  interesting  and  entertaining.  The  intimate  sketches 
of  various  phases  of  London  life  —  visits  to  the  Derby,  Zoo,  the 
National  Gallery  —  are  delightfully  chronicled  and  woven  into  a  novel 
that  is  a  charming  entertainment. 

A  Little  of  Everything 

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Seldom  has  one  author  to  his  credit  so  many  sought-after  travel  books, 
delightful  anthologies,  stirring  juveniles,  and  popular  novels.  In  the 
novel  as  in  the  essay  and  in  that  other  literary  form,  if  one  may  call 
it  such,  the  anthology,  Mr.  Lucas  has  developed  a  mode  and  style  all 
his  own. 

His  new  book,  as  the  title  indicates,  is  a  collection  of  extracts  from 
his  most  popular  writings,  and  there  will  be  recognized  at  once-  the 
favorites  of  long  standing;  in  their  amusing  discursiveness,  their 
recurrent  humor,  and  their  quiet  undertones  of  pathos,  the  reader 
will  catch  many  delighted  glimpses  of  Mr.  Lucas's  originality  and 
distinctiveness. 


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A  Wanderer  in  Florence 

Colored  illustrations  and  reproductions  of  the  great  works  of  art. 
"  All  in  all,  a  more  interesting  book  upon  Florence  has  seldom  been  pro- 
duced, and  it  has  the  double  value  that,  while  it  should  serve  excellently  as 
an  aid  to  the  traveler,  it  is  so  written  as  to  make  a  charming  journey  even 
though  one's  ticket  reads  no  further  than  the  familiar  arm-chair."  —  Spring- 
field Republican. 

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A  Wanderer  in  London 

With  sixteen  illustrations  in  color  by  Mr.  Nelson  Dawson,  and  thirty- 
six  reproductions  of  great  pictures. 

"  Mr.  Lucas  describes  London  in  a  style  that  is  always  entertaining,  sur- 
prisingly like  Andrew  Lang's,  full  of  unexpected  suggestions  and  points  of 
view,  so  that  one  who  knows  London  well  will  hereafter  look  on  it  with 
changed  eyes,  and  one  who  has  only  a  bowing  acquaintance  will  feel  that 
he  has  suddenly  become  intimate."  —  The  Nation. 

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A  Wanderer  in  Holland 

With  twenty  illustrations  in  color  by  Herbert  Marshall,  besides  many 
reproductions  of  the  masterpieces  of  Dutch  painters. 

"  It  is  not  very  easy  to  point  out  the  merits  which  make  this  volume  im- 
measurably superior  to  nine-tenths  of  the  books  of  travel  that  are  offered 
the  public  from  time  to  time.  Perhaps  it  is  to  be  traced  to  the  fact  that 
Mr.  Lucas  is  an  intellectual  loiterer,  rather  than  a  keen-eyed  reporter,  eager 
to  catch  a  train  for  the  next  stopping-place.  It  is  also  to  be  found  partially 
in  the  fact  that  the  author  is  so  much  in  love  with  the  artistic  life  of  Hol- 
land." —  Globe  Democrat,  St.  Louis. 

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A  Wanderer  in  Paris 

Wherever  Mr.  Lucas  wanders  he  finds  curious,  picturesque,  and  unusual 
things  to  interest  others,  and  his  mind  is  so  well  stored  that  everything  he 
sees  is  suggestive  and  stimulating.  He  is  almost  as  much  at  home  in  Paris 
'as  in  London,  and  even  those  who  know  the  city  best  will  find  much  in  the 
"book  to  interest  and  entertain  them. 

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OTHER   BOOKS   BY  E.   V.    LUCAS 

Over  Bemerton's 
A  Novel 

After  seeing  modern  problems  vividly  dissected,  and  after  the  excite- 
ment of  thrilling  adventure  stories,  it  will  be  positively  restful  to  drop 
into  the  cozy  lodgings  over  Bemerton's  second-hand  bookstore  for  a 
drifting,  delightful  talk  with  a  man  of  wide  reading,  who  has  travelled 
in  unexpected  places,  who  has  an  original  way  of  looking  at  life,  and 
a  happy  knack  of  expressing  what  is  seen.  There  are  few  books 
which  so  perfectly  suggest  without  apparent  effort  a  charmingly 
natural  and  real  personality. 

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Mr,  IngleSlde      (The  Macmillan  Fiction  Library) 

The  author  almost  succeeds  in  making  the  reader  believe  that  he  is 
actually  mingling  with  the  people  of  the  story  and  attending  their 
picnics  and  parties.  Some  of  them  are  Dickensian  and  quaint,  some 
of  them  splendid  types  of  to-day,  but  all  of  them  are  touched  off  with 
sympathy  and  skill  and  with  that  gentle  humor  in  which  Mr.  Lucas 
shows  the  intimate  quality,  the  underlying  tender  humanity,  of  his  art. 

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Listener's  Lure 

A  Kensington  Comedy 

A  novel,  original  and  pleasing,  whose  special  charm  lies  in  its  happy 
phrasing  of  acute  observations  of  life.  For  the  delicacy  with  which 
his  personalities  reveal  themselves  through  their  own  letters,  "  the 
book  might  be  favorably  compared,"  says  the  Chicago  Tribune, 
"  with  much  of  Jane  Austen's  character  work  "  —  and  the  critic  pro- 
ceeds to  justify,  by  quotations,  what  he  admits  is  high  praise  indeed; 

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The  Ladies'  Pageant 

BY  E.   V.  LUCAS 

"  An  unusual  collection  of  poetry  and  prose  in  comment  upon  the 
varying  aspects  of  the  feminine  form  and  nature,  wherein  is  set  forth 
for  the  delectation  of  man  what  great  writers  from  Chaucer  to  Ruskin 
have  said  about  the  eternal  feminine.  The  result  is  a  decidedly  com- 
panionable volume."  —  Town  and  Country. 

"  To  possess  this  book  is  to  fill  your  apartment  —  your  lonely  farm 
parlor  or  little  '  flat '  drawing-room  in  which  few  sit  —  with  the  rustle 
of  silks  and  the  swish  of  lawns;  to  comfort  your  ear  with  seemly  wit 
and  musical  laughter;  and  to  remind  you  how  sweet  an  essence 
ascends  from  the  womanly  heart  to  the  high  altar  of  the  Maker  of 
Women."  —  The  Chicago  Tribune. 

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Some  Friends  of  Mine  A  RALLY  OF  MEN 

BY   E.  V.   LUCAS 

At  last  the  sterner  sex  is  to  have  its  literary  dues.  In  this  liitle 
volume  Mr.  Lucas  has  essayed  to  do  for  men  what  he  did  for  the 
heroines  of  life  and  poetry  and  fiction  in  "  The  Ladies  Pageant."  No 
other  editor  has  so  deft  a  hand  for  work  of  this  character,  and  this 
volume  is  as  rich  a  fund  of  amusement  and  instruction  as  all  the 
previous  ones  of  the  author  have  been. 

"  Mr.  Lucas  does  not  compile.  What  he  does,  rather,  is  to  assemble 
a  quantity  of  rough  material,  quarried  from  the  classics,  and  then  to 
fashion  out  of  it  a  fabric  stamped  with  his  own  personality.  .  .  .  He 
makes  a  little  book  in  which  old  poems  and  bits  of  old  prose  take  on 
a  new  character,  through  being  placed  in  a  relation  to  one  another 
determined  by  Mr.  Lucas's  peculiar  fancy.  .  .  .  He  will  always  be 
sure  of  an  appreciative  public."  —  The  New  York  Tribiine. 

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VOLUMES  OF  ESSAYS  BY  E.  V.  LUCAS 

Character  and  Comedy 

"  Of  all  the  readers  of  Charles  Lamb  who  have  striven  to  emulate  him, 
Mr.  Lucas  comes  nearest  to  being  worthy  of  him.  Perhaps  it  is  be- 
cause it  is  natural  to  him  to  look  upon  life  and  letters  and  all  things 
with  something  of  Lamb's  gentleness,  sweetness,  and  humor."  — 
7"he  Tribune.  Cloth,  i6mo,  $  f.2j  net;  by  mail,  $f.jj  net 

One  Day  and  Another 

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papers  make  them  delightful  reading." —  The  Outlook. 

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BOOKS  FOR  CHILDREN 

Anne's  Terrible  Good  Nature 

A  book  of  stories  delightfully  lighted  up  with  such  a  whimsical  strain 
of  humor  as  children  enjoy. 

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The  SloWCOach       (The  Macmillan  Juvenile  Library) 

Mr.  Lucas  has  a  unique  way  of  looking  at  life,  of  seeing  the  humor 
of  everyday  things,  which  exactly  suits  the  butterfly  fancy  of  a  bright 
child.  Decorated  cloth,  illustrated,  $  .50  net 

Another  Book  of  Verse  for  Children 

Verses  of  the  seasons,  of  "  little  fowls  of  the  air,"  and  of  "  the  country 
road  "  ;  ballads  of  sailormen  and  of  battle  ;  songs  of  the  hearthrug, 
and  of  the  joy  of  being  alive  and  a  child,  selected  by  Mr.  Lucas  and 
illustrated  in  black  and  white  and  with  colored  plates  by  Mr.  F.  D. 
Bedford.  The  wording  of  the  title  is  an  allusion  to  the  very  success- 
ful "  Book  of  Verse  for  Children  "  issued  ten  years  ago.  The  Alhenaum 
describes  Mr.  Lucas  as  "  the  ideal  editor  for  such  a  book  as  this." 

Cloth,  8vo,  colored  illustrations,  $  1.30  net 

Three  Hundred  Games  and  Pastimes 

OR,  WHAT  SHALL  WE  Do  Now  ?  A  book  of  suggestions  for  the 
employment  of  young  hands  and  minds,  directions  for  playing  many 
children's  games,  etc.  Decorated  cloth,  x  +  392  pages,  $  2.00  net 


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The  Gentlest  Art 

A  Choice  of  Letters  by  Entertaining  Hands 
EDITED  BY  E.   V.   LUCAS 

An  anthology  of  letter-writing  so  human,  interesting,  and  amusing 
from  first  to  last,  as  almost  to  inspire  one  to  attempt  the  restoration 
of  the  lost  art. 

"There  is  hardly  a  letter  among  them  all  that  one  would  have  left 
out,  and  the  book  is  of  such  pleasant  size  and  appearance,  that  one 
would  not  have  it  added  to,  either."  —  The  New  York  Times. 
"  Letters  of  news  and  of  gossip,  of  polite  nonsense,  of  humor  and 
pathos,  of  friendship,  of  quiet  reflection,  stately  letters  in  the  grand 
manner,  and  na'ive  letters  by  obscure  and  ignorant  folk." 

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The  Friendly  Craft 

EDITED  BY  ELIZABETH   D.   HANSCOM 

In  this  volume  the  author  has  done  for  American  letters  what  Mr.* 
Lucas  did  for  English  in  "The  Gentlest  Art." 

"...  An  unusual  anthology.  A  collection  of  American  letters,  some 
of  them  written  in  the  Colonial  period  and  some  of  them  yesterday; 
all  of  them  particularly  human;  many  of  them  charmingly  easy  and 
conversational,  as  pleasant,  bookish  friends  talk  in  a  fortunate  hour. 
The  editor  of  this  collection  has  an  unerring  taste  for  literary  quality, 
and  a  sense  of  humor  which  shows  itself  in  prankish  headlines.  .  .  . 
It  is  a  great  favor  to  the  public  to  bring  together  in  just  this  informal 
way  the  delightful  letters  of  our  two  centuries  of  history." —  '1  he 
Independent. 

"There  should  be  a  copy  of  this  delightful  book  in  the  collection  of 
every  lover  of  that  which  is  choice  in  literature." —  The  New  York 
Times. 

Cloth,  $1.25  net 


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